Recode Reality (DISCONTINUED)
by Ariza Luca
Summary: Stories cannot and SHOULD NOT be reopened. So when a being that defies the laws of reality itself reopens a story that should never have been able to be reopened, the Hybrid Order of the Stone is going to need the help of new friends, old friends, and old enemies to close this story. To close a reopened story, they're going to need to recode reality itself. (CANCELLED)
1. LOG 2-1

**_LOG 1-175_**

 _Nothing built can last forever. Every legend, no matter how great, fades with time. Each year, more and more details are lost to time and age, until all that remains are myths- half truths._

 _To put it simply, lies._

 _And yet, in all the known universe, from this timeless place to the distant and chaotic Far Lands, from a now-lifeless sprawling desert that was Crown Mesa to a place in the clouds where the sky is literally the limit in Sky City, from a world filled with murder and mystery and zombies to one filled with the most difficult but most amazing games, the legend of what is known to all as the New- or the Hybrid- ORDER OF THE STONE endures, unabridged, as self-evident fact._

 _Indeed, it is only troubled worlds that have need for heroes, and we're lucky to have, not all that long ago, FIVE heroes such as these._

 _PETRA the Blaze hybrid, whose quick blade and even quicker flames were the fiery end to many a battle, even if these flames were occasionally the thing that sparked said battle._

 _OLIVIA the Enderman hybrid, an amazing redstone engineer that was also a creature of the End, where the mysterious creature known as the Ender Dragon used to dwell, so very long ago._

 _AXEL the Creeper hybrid, whose explosive nature and creativity benefited us all, and whose destructive tendencies managed to create and bend and break the laws of what should be possible and not._

 _LUKAS the Ocelot hybrid, whose sharp mind and claws took them to great lengths, and whose loyalty and kindess never wavered, even in the most dire of situations._

 _And JESSE the Spider hybrid, who was always willing to lend her six hands to anyone in need, an amazing multitasker and friend, and leader of the Hybrid Order of the Stone._

 _The road that these five friends have followed has been created by others that came before them. The original Order of the Stone, the Old Builders, the Bureau of Amalgamology. So many new friends have been made in these many worlds that they've traversed. New friends, new enemies, new allies, old friends, deaths and rebirths, memories that have been lost, and found, and rediscovered, and recovered._

 _Their greatest quests have been recorded and stored, in a book that remains in the Order of the Stone's treasure room, a file on a computer in the Bureau of Amalgamology, a distant file on a former scientist's computer, in one of who is known as the 'Author's' computers, and their story will be passed down and retold and passed down again through generations. So many enemies have been defeated, and so many more have been made a friend._

 _These FIVE friends have given so much to be remembered as FIVE heroes, and have proved that what Gabriel the Warrior once said, not so long ago, is true._

 _Anyone can be a hero._

 _Even a hybrid._

 _This has been completed. The book has been closed._

 _Their story has ended._

* * *

 ** _LOG 2-1_**

 _Once a story is complete, it can never be reopened._

 _It's over. No matter how hard you try, even the most powerful Author can do no more but add to it, write more. They can never go back and change the story, for better or worse. No matter how many times you try, how hard you attempt, how desperately you desire it to change, the story can never be reopened. You would have to break the laws of reality itself in order to change it._

 _Theoretically, if a story was reopened, we would have to continue it until there came a time when we could close it once again._

 _But you would be unable to do so._

 _Once a story is reopened, there is almost no way to close it again. A reopened story is trapped in a vicious loop, of closing, reopening, closing again, and reopening again- over and over. The story would go on forever, and ever, and ever, and because every story has an ending- how else would new stories be made?-With no new stories, the natural order would be corrupted, and eventually the story would wipe out the universe itself._

 _That is why stories cannot be reopened, and that is why you would have to change reality itself in order to reopen a story._

 _But what if there was a being in which breaking the very laws of reality, bending and breaking and changing, is child's play?_

 _What if that being was powerful enough to reopen this story, a story that should never be reopened after its completion? A story that CANNOT be reopened after completion?_

 _Of course, you would think that such a feat is impossible. And a few months ago, I would have believed the same thing._

 _There is a children's story that many children in this land hear at night. It's a tale that is told to frighten small children into behavior, the story of a being with glowing white eyes. This being is the general of monsters, leading them to do things and perform strange acts. This being is known as a 'Great and Powerful One' by worshippers of this being with glowing eyes. And, he can change the very laws of reality to do whatever he pleases._

 _What if I told you that this children's story, this myth..._

 _Is real?_

 _What if I told you he is a very much real threat to the very universe itself?_

 _And what if I told you that this children's story can change the laws of reality, the reality that our fearless Hybrid Order of the Stone live in?_

 _And what if I told you that in changing the laws of reality, he has reopened a story that was never meant to be reopened?_

 _My friend, if we are going to have any hope of closing a reopened story, if we're to have any hope in breaking this vicious loop, we are going to have to fight a myth with another myth. A story with a story._

 _And, we are going to have to **RECODE REALITY.**_

* * *

 **A/N: So... yes.**

 **This is the REAL sequel to Hybrid.**

 **I hope you all enjoy.**

 **x.X. A.L. X.x**


	2. A Dark FairyTale

Lukas was curled up in a chair in the library, tail lazily flicking around as he scanned the pages. A little ways away, Reuben was taking a nap halfway buried under a pile of couch cushions that was close (but not too close) to the fire.

He had to commend himself for coming up with the idea coming in here. Not only did he get to read and do 'research' on how people write books (basically an excuse to read 'The Petals of a Bloody Rose' and all of Soren's books ten times over), but he also got to avoid the hullabaloo that was currently going on outside- the library door was soundproof.

It had been almost a whole year since the last Endercon. Lukas couldn't _believe_ how much stuff had happened in between last Endercon and this one. He'd discovered he was a hybrid, he'd left the Ocel- the 'Blaze Rods', and he'd been to other _worlds._

Oh... and Hadrian and Mevia were staying in the house with them.

This was NOT what any of them wanted; least of all Jesse or Jace. Jace and Jesse's eyes both turned a brilliant red whenever either Old Builder neared them, and Lukas could've _sworn_ that Jesse hissed and Jace growled every single time they were even in the same vicinity.

But, they couldn't leave them in the world of giant chickens forever (sadly), Harper thought they were a nuisance, Isa thought they were the most irritating beings to ever exist (maybe save for Aiden or Milo, she got annoyed by them pretty easily), Otto was _kind of_ annoyed with them (just kind of) and Cassie... well, Cassie was pretty furious. But, because all of the former Old Builders wanted nothing what-so-ever to do with Hadrian or Mevia, they got stuck with the two Old Builders.

It wasn't _all_ bad... they were pretty knowledgeable. And Mevia knew some interesting fighting moves, and Hadrian was actually really good at designing. There was a reason he was an Old Builder.

It didn't stop Magnus or Axel from attempting to murder both Old Builders from time to time, however.

Lukas flipped to the last page, set the potion book off to the side (in case Ivor needed it), and then went looking through the other books. There was the Bureau of Amalgamology journal (actually, now that he thought about it, they needed to go poke around that place and see if it was still active... and if it was they needed to shut the place down)... sure, why not, he hadn't read it in three months. He tugged that off the shelf. Hm, there was this book of children's stories...

"Lukas?"

The blonde ocelot hybrid jumped six feet into the air and almost dropped both books on Reuben's head. The pink-haired pig hybrid lowered his arms upon there being no danger in having two rather thick books land right on his head. "Haha, sorry... I was just going to ask if I could read that one?" and he pointed at the Bureau journal.

"Oh... sure," and he handed the book to Reuben, who beamed cheerfully and trotted off to go read it in his pile of pillows. Lukas turned the children's stories book over once in his hand, looking at the battered cover- he was pretty sure Ivor or Soren had owned it at one point- and finally retreated to the chair, flipping it open. The more he read though, the uneasier he felt about the stories.

Unlike the stories he, Jesse, and pretty much every other child their age had grown up with- Cinderella, a milder version of Snow White, Jack and the Beanstalk- these stories were significantly _darker._ Snow White's stepmother danced to death in iron shoes... a horse's skin spoke after it was killed and skinned... the actual story of Little Jack Horner... the Pied Piper of Greenleaf... Bluebeard... jeez, these were _really_ dark for _children's_ stories. No wonder the older generation was so messed up...

Finally, he reached the last tale of the book. The title of the story read _'The Great and Powerful One_ '. Interesting name.

The more he read, the more disturbed he felt about the whole story. The 'Great and Powerful One' was a being with glowing white eyes that cut through the inky blackness of night and could marshal any monster, any malevolent creature of the night to his aid. The most disturbing part? He could control PEOPLE, too. He could even change reality to what _he_ wanted.

The last page of the book was extremely creepy, too- a pair of glowing white eyes illuminated the pitch black pages, and something _red_ and turning brown seemed to have been splattered on the pages. Probably just red or brown paint, but Lukas still felt incredibly uneasy- probably the purpose of the story.

 _'The Great and Powerful One's desire to rule the world proved to be his demise, as a group known as the 'Authors' managed to take him away to a different world, far away from this world that exists here. But his powers and his ability to bend reality itself to his every whim and desire will not be suppressed. Eventually, even if it takes him a thousand years, he will make his way back here. He will make his way back to this world, this crossroads between worlds, and he will take it over again.'_

Lukas stared at the last page of the book for a few more minutes before decisively shutting it again, picking the book up and shoving it back on the shelf before looking for 'The Petals of a Bloody Rose'- he was in the mood for a good love story after all that creepiness.

What he didn't see- what he _couldn't_ have seen- was the pair of glowing white eyes peering in through the darkening sky outside of the library window.

Reuben looked up from the B.O.A. journal, and he spotted a pair of white lights- almost eyes, really- hovering outside the window. He blinked at them as they stared into the room, roving over him, over Lukas, over the entire room as the entity searched around the room silently using the pair of white lights hovering outside.

And then it blinked.

And then they were gone.

* * *

 **A/N: Holy crap, one hour and we already have 5 reviews.**

 **Like wow 0-0**

 **RQTC: How did you discover Hybrid?**

 **NoItsBecky: Eee thanks :3**

 **Choco: I'll do my best, chief :3**

 **TheRealRedGaming: haha thanks xD**

 **angelwings: I'll put hints but that's it, sorry xD**

 **RapidSammi: (laughs) Well, glad to see you like so far x3**

 **x.X. A.L. X.x.**


	3. Explode, Shimmer, Break

It seemed like a really nice day. The sun was shining, the birds were singing, and, oh look, another explosion went off in the Order of the Stone's house. They lived a fair distance from town- you know, so they didn't wake everyone up at the crack of dawn with all these explosions.

"GET YOUR OLD BUILDER BUTTS BACK HERE!"

Jesse blinked up at Lukas, who looked a bit unsettled about something while he ate his own breakfast (which consisted of fish). She decided not to ask about it, though- not over breakfast, at least. Especially since Reuben was perched on her lap and stealing from her plate of toast. "How long have they been doing this?"

Lukas checked his watch. "I have been up since 4 AM, and they were up at this point. So... well, I know it's been at least four hours..."

"Ah, is that so?"

"Mm."

Another explosion, this time from the basement. Jesse's extra arms caught the silverware that rattled right off the table from this one and set it back on the table as Ivor stomped back up the steps, ashes dripping off his hair as the potionologist scowled.

"Was it the Blaze Powder or the Ghast Tear?" Jesse asked, not even blinking.

"Both, this time- it has to be noted that mixing them together, while not creating a more explosive mixture, makes an... extremely _volatile_ mixture," Ivor growled softly, raking a hand through his hair again and making ashes scatter all over the floor.

Jace skidded into the room with a loud bark of excitement, making Lukas flinch with a yowl and Jesse find herself with a very frightened ocelot hybrid perching on her shoulders. The chair started to topple backwards, but Ivor put a stop to that by grabbing the back and making the front legs of the chair thud down decisively again. "Good morning, Jace. What's up?" he asked the mocha-haired wolf hybrid.

Jace's tail was wagging so fast it was a literal blur, green eyes sparkling. "Oh, hi, Ivor, Jesse, kitty-" Jesse smirked; Jace _still_ had the penchant of calling Lukas 'kitty' and it annoyed the blonde ocelot hybrid to no end, "have you seen Petra? She promised to play fetch with meeeeeee!" And he did a little dance.

"Did you eat sugar this morning, Jace?" Ivor asked, sounding more amused than anything.

"Maybe a liiiiiittle. Or a looooot. Depends on if you count six bowls of Frosted Flakes a lot," Jace practically chirped, tail still wagging at the speed of light.

Jesse smirked a bit and stretched, all six arms flaring out as her red-and-green eyes squinted shut. Good ol' Jace. "Haha. Well, to answer your question, no; I haven't seen Petra."

"Awwww! Well, see you all later bye!" And Jace was out of the room again, making the door swing on the hinges a little crazily in his wake.

Lukas fell off of Jesse's shoulders with a yelp, making Jesse wince sympathetically and twist to see him from his location on the floor. "Ouch, you alright there, Lukas?"

"Yes, I'm fine, thank you," he replied breathlessly, running a hand through his messy blonde hair and making it stand on end. Reuben giggled cheerfully and stole another slice of toast off of Jesse's plate. The spider hybrid lifted him up rapidly, making the pig hybrid let out a shriek of laughter as she tossed him up. "Hey! Gimme back my toast ya little thief!" she joked, making Lukas laugh and Ivor smirk as he dusted more ashes out of his hair.

Another explosion went off, and Jesse glanced back at the kitchen door. "Don't blow up anything important, Axel!" she yelled out the door so he could hear.

"'Kay!" he called back. Another explosion promptly went off.

* * *

"Steve, did you find him?"

The man with tan skin and dark brown hair's blue eyes scanned the screen, eyes narrowing in concern. "I-I don't know!" he called back to the redhead a little ways back, "He's not anywhere I can see-" His hands stopped moving from where they'd been resting on the keyboard. "...wait..."

"Wait? Wait what?" Long red hair dripped over his shoulder and rested on the back of his hand, the pale woman's face next to his, green sparkling and reflecting the light of the screen. "Did you find something?"

"I- I don't know? I think?"

"What's that, we need a definite answer."

"Okay, _yes_ , I found him, but..."

"What _is_ it?!"

"..." He hesitated, before showing the young woman the image currently flickering on the screen. She squinted at it, before her eyes widened, green shrinking to pinpricks in her face. "Oh."

A short pause.

"Why is the screen shimmering like that?"

"..."

"Oh _sh-!_ "

* * *

The figure with white eyes... who looked oddly like 'Steve', except surrounded by a strange, dark smoke, was standing in the Hybrid Order of the Stone's treasure room.

A strange smile sneaked its way across his face at the thought of the blonde ocelot hybrid curled up in the chair reading, his brow creasing, and the little pig hybrid reading his own book.

"Hmmm... hybrids," his voice rumbled over the silent treasure room, echoing back. A dark chuckle. "That's an idea."

His head slowly tilted down to look at the smooth, shiny black surface that reflected only his white eyes, warped purple and blurry in the reflective black surface.

"Perhaps we should let that idea have a start, hmm?"

He flickered out of sight, glitching in and out of sight over and over again. Hovering above a barren field, grass slowly beginning to grow up through the black carcass on the ground, tentacles lying limply on the ground. To the treasure room, with the reflective black surface that warped the light of his glowing eyes. Back to the barren field. Back to the treasure room.

"But which one should we have some _fun_ with?"

Another pause, before there was a dark chuckle. "Hm."

Slowly, his head turned so that he was staring at the black surface of the egg.

"Let's give that... what was that pathetic little group called? Oh, yes... _Order of the Stone_ group a little blast from the past, huh?" Another dark chuckle rang out through the room, booming back to him in an eerie echo.

He seemed to vanish a moment later, no sign of his glowing white eyes or even of his existence.

Well, except for one little thing.

A crack appeared in the smooth, shiny surface of the jet-black Ender Dragon egg.

* * *

 **A/N: Unlike Glitch, this'll get exciting in about... (checks) Four chapters or so. Or, well, 'exciting'.**

 **Jeepers 23 reviews for TWO CHAPTERS. That was fast!**

 **RQTC: What are your favorite MCSM fanfics at this point in time? Mine are Elements, Movie Mode, and The First Guests (no it's not because I'm in it, it's because Gommadon is an awesome author).**

 **TheRealRedGaming: RQLC means 'Random Question of the Latest Chapter' xD I have 'Random Question of The Chapter) xD**

 **ThunderstarGames: Coolio :3**

 **GamerwhoGames: 'Eyyy thanks!**

 **RapidSammi: Same here, Sammi-kun. And thanks!**

 **GuestPerson13: Neither can I xD I'm literally winging this as I go xD You too! Happy holidays!**

 **NoItsBecky: (thumbs up) x3**

 **RavenBlaze4850: Yeah some of those are the Brother Grimm fairytales, actually xD**

 **Luna96: No; Glitch is not canon to the Hybrid universe xD**

 **rebekahtpe: Haha xD I'm glad you like it! RQLC: Yes, it's great.**

 **Choco: Heehee x3**

 **ChoyofBonk: You too! And haha xD And yeah, it seems like that might be the case... lol x3**

 **Anonymous: (thumbs up)**

 **SmolGamerBean: (laughs) Whoops, didn't mean to bother your relatives there xD**

 **ChloSky: (is extremely interested in the ceiling) No spoilers.**

 **S4SH4L4SH4theGaMeR101: (starts putting more chapters up) xD**

 **Person: Cool!**

 **MidNightTwist: (laughs) And here come the theories...**

 **x.X. A.L. X.x**


	4. Shatter, Scrape, Heal, and Hiccups?

_..._

 _where am I?_

Hands pressed against a dark surface, a thin, wavery line of light forming on the dark surface.

 _How long have I been here?_

 _How long have I been asleep?_

One hand curled into a fist and hit the dark wall- gently, not able to gain much momentum or strength.

 _I want to get out of here..._

It hit the dark wall a bit more forcefully this time, making the crack of light widen.

 _I want out._

Both hands curled into fists and hit the dark wall again, more forcefully than before, and the crack widened even more.

Cracks slowly started forming all around the figure, light seeping into the dark enclosure.

A purple glow cut through the lessening darkness.

 _I don't want to be in here anymore._

And then the wall shattered.

 _Please._

* * *

Jace pretty much SKIPPED into the treasure room, green eyes darting everywhere. "Hmm~ Where's Petra... oh," and he stopped, blinking a bit, his furiously wagging tail slowing down as he blinked. "Mm?"

There was a supremely pale young woman crouched on the ground, her head down. Her black dress covered up to her ankles but revealed that her feet were bare, and her bare shoulders shook, her short, choppy black hair dripping down towards the floor. Around her were shards of... _something._ Something black, and shiny, and broken. There were faint, thin red lines marring her pale arms and legs- she must've gotten scratched when that... thing had been broken.

Jace ignored that and rushed over to the young woman, crouching down next to her. "Hey, are you okay?"

"... huh...?" The girl lifted her head, shivering slightly as she looked up to meet Jace's gaze, purple eyes practically glowing in her pale face.

Jace crouched down to meet her eyes so she didn't have to tilt her head back to look at him. "Are you okay?" he repeated, wolf ears twitching, tail still wagging at supreme speeds even though half of his attention had been diverted now.

"I... y-yes, I think so," she replied, purple eyes roving the landscape around them as she moved her gaze away. It was then that Jace noticed that part of the black dress splayed on the floor wasn't actually a dress- a large, thick appendage about the width of his arm slowly moved, making his eyes follow it. It trailed down and curled around one of the girl's legs, tapering to a thin point, grayish spikes spaced out in a line on her 'tail'.

"Wh-where am I? I was... there was a ginger... and he had a glowing block," the girl mumbled, looking disoriented, "and then I woke up... and was... trapped in... this small space?" She looked down at the shards of... the egg...

Jace realized with a start that the Ender Egg was gone- and shattered on the floor around the girl currently crouching there.

The girl looked around again, shivering slightly. "Where am I?" she whispered again, shifting a bit and wincing as her cuts on her legs rubbed on the floor, coming closer to some of the black, shiny shards on the floor.

Well, whoever- or _what_ ever she was- she was hurt, and she needed some help.

Jace reached out his hand. The girl backed away a scoot, confusion in her eyes. "Jace. I'm Jace. Nice to meet you. You should probably get some care for your cuts."

"Oh...?" she looked down at the thin red slits on her skin, as if she'd just realized they were there. "Ah... o-okay."

She reached out her own hand and placed it in his, before the two of them slowly unfurled into a standing position, the girl rising and rising until she stood a good two or three heads taller than Jace, who had to tilt his head back to actually see her.

"What's your name, by the way?" he asked, as he led her out of the treasure room, the girl stepping unsteadily.

"Oh...

"I'm Ebony."

* * *

Ebony was sitting on a table in the library while the mocha-haired wolf hybrid went searching for both people and a healing potion. Jace hadn't been able to find anyone as of yet; they were probably off training or getting more supplies. He didn't know, he'd bolted out of the kitchen looking for Petra an hour prior, so he'd had to go looking through the enchanting room for all the potions- he'd managed to find a potion of healing. He knew it was a potion of healing because of the color and the iridescent sheen(okay, and the fact that the potions had all been labelled, courtesy of Ivor).

Ebony was reading a book- the book Lukas had pulled out of the treasure room to edit, to the disappointment of a lot of the townspeople- when Jace came back in with the potion. She looked up at the sound of the door eking open, luminous purple eyes glowing with interest. No, really, they were _literally_ glowing. "Oh- hello, Jace. What's that?"

Jace uncorked it before he handed it to her with a smile. "It's a Potion of Healing- it'll help with your- you know," and he gestured vaguely at her and her shoulders.

Ebony set the book aside and took the Potion of Healing with less shaky hands- she looked much less nervous than before. "Oh. Thank you." And she tipped the potion back so that the green liquid sluiced into her mouth.

The cuts on her shoulders and legs faded so that soon they were faint scars on her skin, before she set the bottle back into her lap. "That feels better," and she checked her arms and legs a bit, tail flickering a bit and curling around one of her legs again.

She tilted her head back so that she was smiling at Jace again. "Thank you," she repeated.

Jace nodded with a small smile before patting her on the shoulder. Suddenly, the door opened, and Jace glanced at the door to see Soren coming in with several books. He practically dropped all the books onto the table before dusting his hands off. "Oh, hello, Jace. And, uh-"

Ebony gasped suddenly and scooted backwards to the point where she fell off the table. Jace twisted to see her moving away from Soren, eyes wide and large with alarm. Jace was about to ask her what was wrong when Ebony scrambled to her feet and darted behind Jace, fingers digging into his shoulders, peering out at Soren, eyes wide with fear.

Jace blinked back at Ebony, before looking back and shooting Soren a confused look, the ginger builder looking just as confused as the wolf hybrid did. "Uhh... maybe we should... get everyone together and figure this out?"

"I would... say that is a sound idea-" Soren was cut off by a very sudden, very oddly high-pitched sound that came courtesy of Ebony.

" _Hic!_ "

* * *

 **A/N: Oh next chapter is going to be _fun_. (evil grin) **

**And then another two chapters...**

 **And then stuff'll start getting interesting.**

 **Well, most likely xD**

 **RQTC: Which character in MCSM is your least favorite and why? (and 'just because' is not an acceptable answer xD )**

 **Mine is just the Witherstorm, because it killed Reuben, Ellegaard/Magnus, gave Petra/Gabriel amnesia or Wither Sickness, and basically tried to destroy the Witherstorm.**

 **rebekahtpe: (laughs) Yep, true.**

 **RavenBlaze4850: Fair enough :)**

 **Luna96: Haha xD And yes, those are/were fun to write :3**

 **S4SH4L4SH4theGaMeR** - **321: Oh...! well thanks!**

 **NoItsBecky: Hehe xD those are some of my favorites, too xD although Hybrid was my favorite to write by far xD**

 **RapidSammi: Please do! And thanks for all the bagels and cookies x3 Nom nom nom**

 **ChloSky: I like rambling xD and I'm hoping for one too x3**

 **J.M.M. : No spoilers. :) and confused about what?**

 **Toni42: Huehuehue x3 Maybe. Cool. And yeah, they were! This one sort of explained it; when 'erasing the Ender Dragon from existence', Soren didn't actually do that- he actually did the closest thing to it, which was to trap the Ender Dragon in an 'endless sleep' inside a prison- said prison being the Ender Egg. Or, well, that's my headcanon for this story, lol xD**

 **x.X. A.L. X.x**


	5. Unexpected

"Hic! Hic! Hic!"

The startle- or fright, more accurately- that Soren had given the dark-haired girl was evidently enough to give her an extremely _severe_ fit of the hiccups.

Ebony was actually starting to bounce in place from the force of each hiccup, and now had pretty much let go of Jace in favor of trying to stop the hiccuping fit by covering her mouth. As her hands went over her mouth, though, her purple eyes widened, and she practically stopped in her tracks, her body starting to quake even harder.

"Hic! Hic! Oh- Hic! Hic! Oh dear- Hic!" she managed through her hiccuping fit, and then she whipped around and bolted out of the room.

"Wait! Ebony, come back!" Jace yelped, dropping to all fours and racing after her, Soren following with an extremely bemused look.

Ebony skidded around three corners, nearly ran face-first into Axel and dodged past the burly griefer with a hiccuped "Excuse me!", making him trail after her with this extremely confused look, practically vaulted over Reuben, who yelped before the burly griefer scooped him up and raced after the short-black-haired girl, making the pig hybrid squeal in surprise, and then bolted through the front door before tripping and landing on her hands and knees, stopping as her shoulder shook with each hiccup.

With each breath she took in as she hiccuped, the breath out became steadily hotter, and hotter, and _hotter_ , before she gave one last sharp gasp, threw her head back and-

A pillar of purple flames came blasting from between her lips as the girl practically _screamed_ , voice grating and becoming almost a monstrous ROAR, shooting high into the sky and scorching a cloud that happened to be floating by, barely missing a few birds, making several of the townspeople jump in startled surprise and look around in shock for the source of the sound.

Somewhere in the distance, a pair of glowing white eyes blinked at the sight of the purple column of flame shooting into the sky, a smirk twitching over the owner's lips.

"Hm."

And then he was gone.

Back with the Order of the Stone, Axel, Reuben, Soren, and Jace gaped at the black haired girl as she coughed a bit, making ashes come floating out of her mouth and dust the ground, as well as a few purple bits of flame which she absentmindedly stomped out, before glancing up at them apologetically.

Soren finally turned to Jace, one eyebrow arched so high it nearly disappeared into his receding hairline.

"Yeah, we need to get everyone together right now."

* * *

Jesse blinked at the short-black-haired girl that was currently shrinking into one of the library's armchairs, coughing sporadically and making a small cloud of ashes puff out of her mouth almost like smoke from a cigarette. A long black tail was curling around her legs, twitching nervously.

Ellegaard and Olivia were covered in redstone and getting it all over the floor (although they seemed to be attempting to swat it off to the best of their ability and failing miserably), Magnus was smelling _suspiciously_ like gunpowder, as were Hadrian and Mevia- the two Old Builders looking shell-shocked about something- Lukas was blinking at them all in confusion, Ivor looked a bit as though he'd gotten ashes all over the basement, since he was covered in a lot of the stuff, Petra and Gabriel were standing near the door, still holding practice weapons- they'd obviously been practicing- Cassie was off visiting Harper (or, well, she SAID she was visiting Harper... Jesse was pretty sure she was also making a stop wherever Aiden was) and Jace was sitting near the black-haired female, who'd identified herself as Ebony.

Ebony seemed to be _extremely_ nervous around any of the Order of the Stone members (the old one, not the new one), purple eyes darting everywhere whenever any of them came within six feet of her.

"Okay, so... you just breathed fire," Axel finally stated flatly to Ebony, "what gives?"

"Ohhh, is that what that was? It startled me," Lukas called out, waving his arm a bit, indeed still looking a bit startled- his blue-green eyes were still dilated.

"It really did; seeing as you then jumped and proceeded to claw me," Jesse said drily, lower arms absentmindedly rubbing the scratch marks on one of her upper wrists.

"I said I was sorry..."

"... it was a joke..."

Soren cleared his throat a bit awkwardly. "Ahh... that may have been my fault. I startled- Ebony, was it?" he directed at the female, who proceeded to flinch at the innocuous question. "Well, anyway, I startled her into a very severe fit of the hiccups, she ran outside, and then she breathed fire."

Ivor started, making everyone look at the black-haired potionologist as he leaned forward, regarding Ebony with faint alarm but definite interest. "I made a stop by the treasure room, and the Ender Egg was broken... was that you? Did you do that?"

"I... I think so? I was inside something dark... and I wanted to get out... s-so I broke it," Ebony said simply, rubbing her head awkwardly as she regarded them all sheepishly. "And I was in- the treasure room? Is that what you call it?"

"She also mentioned a ginger guy holding a glowing block... and then she was stuck inside?" Jace questioned, scratching his head and glancing at Soren, "and then she reacted upon seeing Soren..."

Ebony spoke for the first time, making everyone look at the girl with the tail and the glowing purple eyes. "H-he was the one who... who was holding the block... please don't," Her fists, which were resting in her lap, tightened. "Please don't put me back inside."

The Order of the Stone looked remarkably as though they'd just been _slapped_ , before slowly swivelling to look at the two Old Builders. Every occupant of the room joined them so that soon everyone was staring at Hadrian and Mevia.

Hadrian's expression turned from that shell-shocked look to more of a scowl. "What?" he asked, brusquely.

Jesse cleared her throat a bit, one eyebrow rising by an inch or two. When she spoke again, it was calmer than she was actually feeling internally.

"Do you two know why there's an Ender Dragon hybrid sitting in the armchair?"

* * *

The man was standing in the field, a long black tentacle lying limply near his feet, staring down at the huge black carcass. It gave off this putridly sweet stink, like rotted cake. His white eyes glowed down at the carcass.

"Hm. One down, two to go."

He reached out and clicked his fingers.

A faint, shimmering glow flickered over the carcass for a moment, before it started shrinking, tentacles retracting to a more reasonable size, the body slowly lightening and darkening in the appropriate areas.

A faint glint of white as the man's teeth showed in a smirk.

"I'm sure _this_ particular beastie'll bring back some... ahh, _interesting_ memories."

And he vanished again, a curl of black smoke remaining in place this time, dissipating a moment later as the body stirred for a moment.

Slowly, a girl sat up, suit legs pressing against the hard-packed dirt ground and smearing over the black, pale purple formal shirt smudged with dirt as well. Her curly locks dangled, looking faintly limp and almost lank, as if she hadn't washed her hair in a while. One eye was purple, but the other was closed, an ugly, harsh scar practically carved through it and her deathly pale skin. The pale quality of _this_ girl's skin was nowhere near the quality of Ebony's- on the contrary, she looked as though she were pale from some sort of violent illness, faintly purple bags under her indigo eye.

"I... what..." Her eye scanned the landscape, before it slowly started to roll back into her head, the shock of everything too overwhelming for the ill-looking girl.

" _Who am I...?_ " she whispered, before her eye closed again and she slumped back to the dirt.

* * *

 **A/N: Hehehe x3 This got very interesting**

 **Okay, so, I lied- might take a few chapters more than I was anticipating. Up to 12 at the most, just mainly for explanation and stuffs like that (and for some people to make a little appearance). Sorry about exposition, lol xD**

 **And lol, sorry, last time I typed 'Witherstorm tried to destroy the Witherstorm' xD I meant the world, haha.**

 **RQTC: How bad would you say the traffic is where you are?**

 **I swear, Taiwan has a car accident every freaking day. The traffic is absolutely atrocious...**

 **TheRealRedGaming: _Ooh_ , yeah.**

 **NoItsBecky: Lol thanks for that xD**

 **ChoyofBonk: Hehe x3 That was my intention**

 **x.X. A.L. X.x**


	6. Who are You?

"Why do you ALWAYS assume that things are our fault?" Hadrian asked a bit bitterly, a scowl on his face.

"Because things DO tend to be your fault. And besides, this is a HYBRID- your area of expertise, remember?" Lukas pointed out, blue-green eyes narrowing slightly. He was still easily annoyed by the duo of builders.

Mevia picked up before Hadrian could snap back, although she seemed pretty annoyed anyways. "No, we had nothing to do with this. I've never seen or heard of an 'Ender Dragon' before, and I've never seen this girl in my life."

Ebony squinted at Mevia and Hadrian, before nodding in agreement. "They're right- I don't know them."

"You could've had your memory suppressed, like these guys," Ellegaard suggested, gesturing at the group of hybrids, but surprisingly Jace was the one to speak up defensively. "I don't know... I think they might be telling the truth."

"That would be because we _are_ telling the truth," Mevia growled, looking frustrated, murky cyan eyes narrowing.

Jesse put all six of her hands up in surrender, making Ebony blink at her. "You know what? I think they're telling the truth, too. They never even go to the treasure room, so as to how they'd get Ender Dragon DNA... I don't even know. Besides, it's getting easier to read them. They're not lying."

Jace nodded in agreement. "Yeah, they're telling the truth."

Mevia and Hadrian were staring at them with this faintly grateful look. Jesse glanced at the two of them. "Don't you two get any funny ideas about this- I still haven't forgiven you. But..." she hesitated for a good minute before tentatively finishing the sentence. "I'm trusting you on this."

The two Old Builders gave each other faintly surprised looks at that.

Jesse stared at them evenly before clapping her hands together and looking around. "Alright! Well, I think Jace and I are going to head out to go get some groceries and calm down any of the townspeople. Anyone coming with?"

"I think I'll tag along," Ivor decided, although his face twisted into a faintly nervous one- the townspeople weren't the biggest fans of the guy still, although at least they mostly ignored him. His rather... um, 'eccentric' personality didn't help much in terms of making them like him, either. "I need to get some more potion ingredients."

Lukas waved a bit. "I'll, um, I'll stay back and talk to Ebony a bit. I mean, I have to edit the book, anyway, so I might as well..." he trailed off, before shrugging sheepishly.

"Ooh, are you going to be in the library?" Ebony seemed to perk up a bit. "It's just... I love reading."

"Um, yep. Wanna come with?" he offered, ocelot ears twitching a bit nervously.

"... okay!" And she followed him, tail wagging a little bit.

Olivia blinked after her. "... she must _really_ like reading."

Jesse grabbed a bag and some of her money, headed for the door. "Everyone else can go do whatever- Axel, Magnus, don't blow up anything important."

"Do Hadrian and Mevia count as important?" Magnus questioned, jerking a thumb at the two Old Builders, both of whom tensed rather noticeably upon the King of Boom Town pointing at them.

"... don't blow up anything important or any human beings," the spider hybrid corrected after a moment's hesitation.

"Awww..."

* * *

"AAAAAAAAAHHHHHHH-OOF!" Steve's scream got cut off by the tan man (haha, that rhymed) getting a mouthful of dirt as he slammed into the ground, a tree's branches slowing his fall and whipping his face, his arms, his chest, before he dropped through back to the ground. He gasped in pain once from the feeling of his leg cracking from the impact of him landing on the ground after _quite_ a fall, and another time when the red-haired female slammed into him in turn and yelped, another crack ringing out.

Alex muttered sixteen swears as she rolled off of him, clutching her left arm. "Ahhh... crap, I think my arm's broken," she groaned, looking at the bent-out-of-shape arm, and indeed her arm was twisted in a very odd way. There seemed to be some blood on her cheek, and a dark stain was starting to spread over one of her dark brown pant legs, a gash in both the pant leg and her leg.

"I think I broke my leg," and Steve looked down at his leg to see it twisted awkwardly as well. His toes weren't supposed to twist that way, right?

Not to mention he had a nasty headache from his head hitting the floor as well... and something warm and sticky was starting to trickle down his face from something that seemed to be sharply stinging...

A surge of nausea welled up in his chest, and he gagged as he clamped a hand over his mouth, the other hand going to his stomach. Alex cringed as she tried to adjust her position without putting any weight on her damaged arm.

"Did you hear that?"

Steve's head snapped up at the female-sounding voice, still fighting the wave of nausea that was threatening to overtake him. A boy with pointy brown ears (wolf ears?) was trotting through the underbrush, green eyes widening upon seeing the two of them. A tail that was ramrod straight was slowly relaxing into a slow, sweeping appendage. "Um... Jesse...?" His voice was rising in pitch.

"Oh- oh gosh!" The female's voice source was revealed upon a girl with... black hair and six arms, and a green and red eye stepping through the trees, her own eyes widening.

A man with long black hair and a beard shoved his way through the underbrush, snapping a few branches as he yanked nondescript brown robes and a belt with a blue stone on it out of the bushes, making him trip and stumble a bit. His dark blue eyes narrowed, before he started rifling through his bag. "Hang on, I've- I've got a healing potion or two in here- got it!" Yanking out two green bottles, and almost fumbling them, he quickly uncorked them and held them out to both Steve and Alex.

Alex's right arm reached out and took the bottle as she regarded it. She gave it a quick sniff before tilting the bottle back.

Steve shook his head when the man held it out to him. "No, thanks- I- I don't think I could-" He gagged again, shoving his hand back to his mouth.

"This'll help," the man said, dark blue eyes sparkling impatiently.

Steve removed his hand to protest again, but the man let out a sigh before he quickly shoved the bottle out to him and dumped the green mixture into his mouth. Steve was so shocked that his reflex motion was to swallow.

Immediately, Steve's leg snapped back to the correct position it was supposed to be in, the stinging thing on his forehead ceased to exist, and the headache faded to a dull throb in the back of his mind. His rebelling stomach also calmed down, the swell of nausea vanishing. Alex's arm had also returned to normal, and while her brown pants had a large gash in them still, the gash in her leg was gone- though the blood wasn't.

"Oh. Thank you," he said, letting out a soft sigh of relief.

"It was nothing," the man said, looking just as relieved, "glad to see you two strangers are all right."

There was an awkward silence where all of them were just staring at each other, before the girl with six arms rubbed her head sheepishly using one of her uppermost arms. "So, um...

"Who are you guys?"

* * *

 **A/N: Heehee x3**

 **A few more chapters before everything gets all exciting**

 **RQTC: Who thinks there might be a second season of MCSM? And what's your opinion on it?**

 **For all their saying that there won't be a second season, or Episode 9, or etc, they sure hint at it a lot, so... I think there might be. I'd be okay with a season 2- as long as they're going for quality rather than quantity. But whatever Telltale Games decides, I'm sure it's for the best. :3**

 **No new reviews :3**

 **x.X. A.L. X.x**


	7. Shopping (not for Clothes) Alarm

"So... you're a spider hybrid?" Steve questioned Jesse (whose name he now knew), before holding up an orange. "Is this good?" he asked her.

Jesse looked at it. "Too orange. Look for one that's faintly green so that we have more time before we have to eat it." Steve nodded and set the orange he was holding back down.

"Oh, okay..." Alex had apparently heard that too and set hers down, looking through some more. "Are you famous here or something, by the way?"

The only reason the redhead was asking was that they'd already been to three various shops, and each time the shop vendor tried to insist that it was free for the group. Each time Jesse ignored their protests and left them money (or, in the case of the third one, hid the fee under some of their wares, since that particular shop vendor shouted them down).

Jesse laughed sheepishly, reaching up and rubbing her head. Ivor and Jace had gone off to go buy potion ingredients (since apparently Jace's nose was phenomenal and he could note subtle differences in the scents of the ingredients), so it was just the three of them looking for fruit, meat, and just basically groceries. "Um, yeah... well, how do I explain it...?"

And she summarized up the events with the Witherstorm up as succinctly as possible. She also mentioned a few of their other adventures, but waved them off when they gave her a weird look and said she'd tell them later.

"Wow," Alex finally finished, one eyebrow going up. "That is _awesome._ "

"Haha, thanks. But, are you not from around here? Pretty much EVERYONE in our world knows about the 'Hybrid Order of the Stone'," Jesse asked them, lower arms expertly weighing melons as she glanced at the two of them.

The two people tensed up a bit, giving each other nervous looks. "Um..." Alex said, reaching up and rubbing the back of her head, making her long red hair dance around, "well..."

"It's, um..." Steve rubbed his own head.

"... ah, don't worry about it," Jesse said after a moment, giving them a sheepish grin, "that was kind of a rude question to be asking. Sorry."

"Oh, it's fine," Steve hurried to assure her, although he looked a bit relieved. Alex looked pretty relieved by that as well.

 _They're honest people... they could've lied if they didn't want to tell me._

She finally decided on one of the melons, fought to give the vendor the fee, and finally made it out of the shop, Ivor and Jace meeting up with them. Ivor's bag looked noticeably heavier- and a bit lumpier- than when they'd first come out.

"Good haul?" Jesse asked, smiling as a lower hand went on her hip.

"Yes, thank Notch- Jace was extremely helpful," and Ivor gave the wolf hybrid a faint smile. The mocha-haired boy returned it.

"Oh, did he help you find some good quality ingredients?" Steve asked, his eyebrow going up as he looked at the two of them.

The two males exchanged a look.

* * *

 _"That'll be 70 iron," the shopkeeper said gruffly._

 _The two of them had poked around the shop, Jace occasionally sniffing the ingredients and pointing out one of the better ones, and finally made it to the cashier. Now, Ivor had been checking the price each time he added an ingredient, and knew the total of the whole thing wasn't NEARLY that much- only about twenty, at most. But he wouldn't get anywhere if he didn't pay, so he reached into his bag-_

 _"Hey, what are you talking about?" Jace sounded_ extremely _affronted by this, "the total's only about 18 iron!" Ah, so_ that _was the amount of the total._

 _The shopkeeper's eyes hardened. "Look, buddy, this guy nearly destroyed our whole world and killed thousands of people. You'd be better off staying away from him-_ "

 _Jace's hands slammed with incredible force onto the counter, making the shopkeeper start back in shock._ " _Oh_ yeah?" _Jace's eyes had gone blood-red now, and he was starting to growl, tail ramrod straight and ears flattened back against his head as he leaned closer to the shopkeeper, so close that his face was mere inches away. Ivor stepped back a bit subtly- he hadn't seen Jace THIS angry before. Angry, yes. Furious, no. "Well, it's too bad for me, then, because he's my sister's_ dad _, so you'd better lay off him before I report you to her, mister!"_

 _Ivor stared at Jace. Jace usually seemed pretty mild around him- or, well, a little apathetic, but now here he was glaring at a shopkeeper over a jilted price._

 _The shopkeeper's expression faded to a more nervous one at the sight of Jace's glowing red eyes and bared teeth. "Uhh- a-alright. You can have it free of charge," he directed at Ivor nervously._

 _Ivor shook his head and fished out eighteen iron, laying them on the counter. "The total price is eighteen iron. The ingredients are good quality. I'll add in a couple," and he put another two on the counter, "as compensation for..." He hesitated, before vaguely waving._

 _The shopkeeper blinked as Ivor nodded at Jace. "Come along, Jace."_

* * *

"... something like that," Ivor finally replied. "Come on, we should get home and get you two cleaned up."

Although Steve and Alex hadn't noticed, they looked kind of a mess, and some of the townspeople were giving them awkward looks and wondering what was going on with them.

"Oh, yeah- and we've got to introduce you to everyone else, too." Jesse grinned a bit lopsidedly at them. "C'mon, let's go!"

They'd gotten halfway back, breaking out into a field chatting about all of the Hybrid Order of the Stone's adventures and laughing about some of the moments (Jesse happened to be narrating the part where PAMA was possessing everyone and pulling a face while she played around with it, making everyone crack up), when she spotted something, and she dropped the face. "Hm?"

Ivor noticed the bemused, faintly alarmed expression on her face. "What is it, Jesse?"

"There- there's someone..." Jesse's voice trailed off, and she raised her arm to point at what she was indicating.

Everyone's eyes followed her pointing finger to see a tiny-looking figure slumped to the ground not too far away.

"Oh no!" Jace bolted over, Jesse following with an alarmed look on her own face, "is she okay?"

Steve and Alex ran over to go check, and Ivor followed after a moment. For a moment, alarm bells in the back of his head had started ringing. Wasn't there something missing...? From this landscape here?

And then he'd decided it wasn't that important and run after the group.

* * *

 **A/N: Okay, so I'mma calculate there's a good... 3 or 4 more chapters before everything starts getting super exciting, but I might be wrong. So that's what I'm projecting... xD**

 **Wow, comments at midnight (for you guys)- you must really like reading on FFN if you're still up!**

 **RQTC: What are your phobias? Mine is trypophobia (no, seriously, look up the definition of trypophobia on Wikipedia and you will find this creepy af picture on there. It's a lotus seed... I think? I don't know, I'm not looking at that picture again)**

 **S4SH4L4SH4theGaMeR101: Lol! xD Thanks man**

 **Luna96: Yeah get some sleep, man xD**

 **RavenBlaze4850: (grins a bit) Oh... you'll see what I have planned for this...**

 **TheRealRedGaming: Haha xD Yeah, I guess. I'll do my best, but I cannot promise anything. x3**

 **x.X. A.L. X.x**


	8. Return

"Ivor, do you have a potion to wake her up?" Jesse called, giving the unconscious girl on the ground a little shake that did absolutely nothing. Said girl was completely limp, as limp as her lank hair which trailed through the dirt. Her black suit and pale purple shirt were both smeared with dirt, and her sickly pale face with the cruel scar cutting through one eye had a smudge of dirt on the cheek.

"Uhh- yes! Yes, right here, yes," and Ivor yanked out a bottle of a clear liquid that looked a LOT like water. He uncorked it after checking the bottle and gave it an experimental sniff.

He proceeded to recoil a bit and clamp a hand over his nose, wincing at the odor of the substance. "Ah- yep, that's definitely it," he eked out, sounding rather nasal from his hand being clamped over his nose- and he held it out to Jesse.

Jesse smelled it faintly, since the bottle was open- honestly, it smelled faintly of lemons- and poured it into the girl's mouth, Steve propping the girl up.

Not even one minute passed when the girl slowly started to shift, then to stir. Her facial expression tightened slightly, before one eye- the eye without the scar running through it- slowly fluttered open, revealing a tired indigo eye.

"Hey there! Are you alright?" Jesse asked, giving the girl what she hoped was a reassuring smile.

The girl's head slowly shifted as she blinked, slowly at first and more rapidly as she woke up more, pushing herself upright. "Hm...?" She murmured almost sleepily, blinking again. "I... who are you?" She tilted her head, eye slowly and serenely flickering up to the sky, reflecting a stray cloud that happened to be passing by. "For that matter, who am I?"

"Ohhh no," Steve groaned, slapping a palm to his forehead. He didn't have to say why he was groaning for everyone in the immediate vicinity to get why.

Jesse's lips tilted downwards in a frown. "Ahh. Well, anyway, are you alright?"

The girl's eyes narrowed at her a bit, but in more of a curious manner than a suspicious one. "I... yes, I-I think so?" She absentmindedly rubbed her head, smudging a blob of dirt over her forehead.

"Well, we should probably get you back to our place to give you a quick checkup," Jace said, looking the girl over before giving an experimental sniff. He winced a bit and pinched his nose surreptitiously, trying to make sure that the mysterious girl didn't notice. She didn't, thankfully, but Jesse did and she shot her brother a raised eyebrow.

"Here, easy, _easy_..." Together, Steve and Alex braced themselves to help lift the girl to her feet-

"... you're _light._ This is actually quite worrying- Steve, let go of her for a second."

Steve shot Alex his own raised eyebrow. She rolled her eyes and gave him a pointed look, upon which he slowly relinquished his grip and Alex lifted the slight girl into the air. "Okay, _no_ , you are seriously light, this is- Ivor! Get over here!"

"Wh-? O-okay?" Ivor came over, staring at Alex bemusedly as Alex set the black-haired girl back on the ground, her indigo eye blinking around at all of them. "Pick her up," Alex ordered.

"Wha?"

"Just do it."

Ivor looked totally bewildered, before glancing at his adopted daughter. Jesse gestured faintly impatiently at him, green-and-red eyes filled with curiosity, so he turned back around, knelt down, braced himself and-

"Okay, no, you are lighter than Reuben- _how_ are you lighter than _Reuben-_ "

"Can we worry about weight phenomenons later?" Jesse asked teasingly, making Ivor nearly drop the blinking girl in his arms. He quickly apologized and set her back on her feet, the girl looking at her feet bemusedly as if she'd never used them before, "we should head back and get you three cleaned up, you look a holy mess."

And indeed, Steve and Alex were covered in blood and their clothes were torn, and the black-haired girl's clothing was smudged in dirt and she looked pale and sickly. The three of them exchanged a look (the girl having to look up a bit to exchange the look) before nodding at Jesse, Alex smiling as she ran a hand through her red hair. "Lead the way."

Jesse smiled back and started walking again, Ivor and Jace dancing forward a bit to catch up with her. "Jesse, sorry about being a little rude a bit before to her-" her wolf-hybrid brother responded, dropping his voice to the lowest volume possible.

"What, you mean where you pinched your nose? Yeah, you usually don't do that unless it's _really_ strong, what gives?" Jesse whispered back, brow crinkling.

"It's _weird_ \- she smelled a little like..." Jace's lips twitched as he tried to figure out what the English terms for what he was smelling was. Jesse had learned that dogs/wolves actually had a word in dog/wolf language for every smell possible, but some didn't exist in English. Apparently this one did, though, because he finally replied, his expression still thoughtful, "I think the closest way of describing it is a mixture of a smell of burning rubber and burned cake."

THAT nearly made Jesse stop in her tracks. She'd only smelled that smell a few times before... back when-

"... this is the field where the Witherstorm was, wasn't it?"

Her voice was so low that Jace was the only one able to pick it up besides Jesse herself, and he relayed the message in a low voice to Ivor (although he seemed a little confused about who/what the 'Witherstorm' was). The already pale potionologist was so incredibly pale that he looked nearly like a glass of milk. "... I thought so," he mumbled back.

The two of them exchanged a look, before turning to glance over their shoulder. The short, thin, pale girl was listening intently to what Steve and Alex were discussing, every once-in-a-while nodding at them in agreement.

They didn't know how, but...

It looked like this short, thin, pale girl who looked as though she'd get blown away by the first good gust of wind just might be the Witherstorm.

* * *

Harper smudged some dust off her face as she trudged into the cavern.

Crown Mesa was slowly getting better- with the water she'd managed to hide away from PAMA, they were able to start getting things back to normal- although the villagers were still wary of her. Well, that couldn't really be helped- she would just have to try harder, now wouldn't she?

She stepped into the cavern that was still full of redstone trails, although they were dead and dull now, rather than full of light. She glanced up at where the huge computer screen still was...

Only to see it totally gone.

Her heart leapt into her throat, and she slowly looked around. Who could've come in here and gotten rid of the screen? Certainly not any of the Crown Mesa citizens; they were extremely leery of the place and wouldn't come in here for a million pieces of iron-

Her eyes landed on a figure that seemed to have green hair, but it was too dark for her to really make out.

She carefully edged towards them, slowly reaching into her back pocket and pulling out a wrench- it wouldn't do much if this thing turned out to be unfriendly, but-

Slowly, the figure's head lifted and turned to face her.

All of the air was sucked out of Harper's lungs.

Kneeling on the ground and looking at her with blank-seeming green eyes (no, really- even the whites of the eyes were pale green), tousled red hair, and oddly _silver_ skin, was a boy, hardly even a teenager.

But that's not what made Harper suddenly unable to breathe.

"Is that you?" The boy asked in a soft voice, tentatively, brow furrowing.

No, it wasn't that at all.

It was just that this boy had this... I don't know, _aura._ He gave off this feeling... this feeling that he was...

"My Creator?" PAMA asked, shakily.

Unnoticed by the two figures, a pair of white glowing eyes watched the scene, before a soft scoff emitted from its throat, and it vanished in a curl of black smoke.

 _Three._

* * *

 **A/N: PAMA IS BACK! YEAH!**

 **No, but seriously, I'm really excited to write the next few chapters. (determined face)**

 **RQTC: Who was your FAVORITE villain?**

 **Mine is actually Cassie Rose- partially because girl villains are cool, and partially because I felt sorry for her.**

 **S4SH4L4SH4theGaMeR101: No spoilers :3**

 **J.M.M.: Glitch and the Christmas story are the same, and it's completed now xD so this one. And thanks! Glad you like them. Also, no problemo :3**

 **Toni42: I know, right? Sooo much better!**

 **SquiddytheBlaze: Better late than never, right? Also he's not being stupid, he's being really salty about the whole Witherstorm situation. Ivor usually won't argue about it because he knows it's no good, but Jace is extremely defensive.**

 **ChoyofBonk: Huehuehue :3 And oh... ouch, yeah, I can see why.**

 **RapidSammi: No, clowns are creepy af. I agree with you on that.**

 **TheRealRedGaming: You know, since I fell in love with Muffet's character in Undertale and since writing Hybrid, I'm not quite so frightened of spiders anymore. Huh.**

 **rebekahtpe: RQLC - oh you know it. Ugh. I hate pop-up ads.**

 **angelwings: Nice! You too!**

 **x.X. A.L. X.x**


	9. Thunder Child and Computer Child

"So... what's the Witherstorm exactly?"

Having wrangled everyone back into the library while Jesse helped the mystery girl get clean, Ivor had hastily explained that the girl appeared to be- at this point in time- the Witherstorm. This little bit of news had been met with an extremely long, shocked silence, until finally Jace cleared his throat and _extremely_ timidly asked that question, Ebony also looking curious about this and setting her book in her lap, and Hadrian and Mevia trying not to look curious and failing miserably. Steve and Alex had heard the barest summary of the Witherstorm, but still looked interested about this.

"... oh, yeah." And Olivia blinked before glancing at Petra, the Blaze hybrid starting to emit sparks uncomfortably, and the room starting to become uncomfortably warm. "You weren't there during its little, uh, rampage."

"The Witherstorm was a- uh, well, a- a Super Wither," Lukas began, voice becoming more and more sarcastic as the seconds ticked along, his tail starting to flicker and smack everything within a 3-foot-radius, including Olivia, Axel, Petra, himself, and Hadrian's leg (Hadrian edged away from the blonde ocelot hybrid) nervously. "Th-that basically tried to eat up the entire world, and nearly killed Ellegaard, and _actually_ killed Reuben, and nearly killed everything good and alive and holy in this world _like actually holy crap it started getting really scary and ate people up and-people-were-dying-but-not-really-and-gave-Petra-Wither-Sickness-and-Gabriel-amnesia-and-holy-actual-_ "

Ebony's tail sailed up from behind her out of nowhere and slapped Lukas on the back, making the blonde ocelot hybrid gag and cough up a hairball. Everyone stared at it for a moment before Lukas cleared his throat again. "But, um, yeah- the Witherstorm was this Wither that caused a lot of destruction in this world... it- it gave some of us PTSD. If that thing were to go on a rampage again... all I can say about that is, it was hard enough to defeat it the first time around, and we had our fair share of sacrifices."

There was an uncomfortable silence, before Hadrian accidentally brought the most jarring part of this whole situation back into focus.

"And now it's back again, isn't it."

Before anyone could say anything to this incredibly unsettling declaration, footsteps sounded in the hallway, making them all fall silent and turn to face the door. Jesse eked the door open, the short, curly-haired girl edging in behind her. Her hair seemed fuller and more healthy, but it still didn't change the sickly pallor of her face or the scar through her eye. Her indigo eye moved around the room carefully, scrutinizing everyone in the room, hands tightening slightly on the new white t-shirt and gray pants that Jesse had lent her.

Everyone exchanged nervous looks, unsure what to do, when suddenly Ebony was extending her hand, a serene expression on her face. "Hello- I'm Ebony. What is your name?" she asked, calmly, brushing back her own short black locks of hair.

The girl blinked at Ebony for a moment, looking from the pair of purple eyes that were meeting her indigo one with a slight smile playing on her lips, to the hand she was extending, and back to her face again. "I- ah- I don't know," she said, her hand shakily moving and taking ahold of Ebony's, giving it a slow shake.

"Oh... hmm..." Ebony shook the hand as well, her free hand moving and gently thumbing the side of her mouth. "I see..."

"Maybe we could give her a temporary name until she remembers?" Ellegaard suggested, glancing at the curly-black-haired girl nervously.

The Witherstorm-girl tilted her head, indigo eye practically glowing as she considered this. "I... I think that would be okay," she said, slowly, slowly reaching up as she released Ebony's hand to rub her head.

"Okay, um..." Ellegaard bit her lip as she scrambled for a name. "Charlotte?"

The girl considered the name for a moment, before shaking her head politely, and then again, and then again so that it became more of a continuous shaking motion as she shook her head patiently to all of the suggestions.

"Emily."

"Samantha."

"Florentine."

"Ruby?"

"Jane."

"Riley?"

"Nariko?" Jesse suggested, looking tentatively at the curly-haired girl. She remembered that that name meant something like... 'thunder child' or something. Storms had thunder- well, some of them anyway.

The curly-haired girl began to shake her head, before pausing, considering the question, and then nodding, pressing her palms together as she did so and looking much like a young girl as she did so, .

"Okay, then. Nice to meet you, Nariko," Ebony smiled at the girl kindly.

And Nariko blinked at her again before her lips slowly curved up into its own little shy smile. "Nice to meet you, too," she answered, oblivious to the nervous looks everyone else in the room was exchanging, before she turned to regard the rest of the room.

There was a full minute of extremely pregnant silence, before Jesse took the lead and stepped forward, Reuben trying to shy behind her and Jesse gently tugging him back out. "Hi. I probably should've mentioned this before, but..." The black-haired spider hybrid chuckled and pressed a hand to her collarbone. "My name is Jesse. Nice to meet you!" She then gently nudged Reuben out from behind her so the little pink pig hybrid was at least at her side. "And this is Reuben."

"Oh... yes!" And Nariko nodded and bowed a bit, inclining her head politely. "It's nice to meet you, Reuben."

Alex bounced up to her feet from where she was perched on the couch and clasped Nariko's hand, making her jump away several inches in surprise from the slightly over-excited redhead's sudden movement, "I'm Alex. It's nice to meet you, Nariko!"

As everyone started slowly getting up to greet the Witherstorm hybrid, nobody noticed the pair of glowing white eyes that were flashing at them from outside the window, before vanishing in a wispy curl of black smoke.

* * *

Harper could only stare.

PAMA slowly began to try to get himself to his feet, but he staggered a bit and sank onto his knee again.

Harper snapped out of it, quickly crossing over the huge distance, hand tightening on the wrench, gray eyes hardening because she had to make sure that PAMA didn't hurt anyone anymore-

A pair of arms flung itself around her legs.

Harper staggered a bit, actually stumbling backwards and falling backwards onto her bottom from the shock of the 'hug attack'.

PAMA was _seriously_ young-looking- like, he didn't even look like he was _thirteen_. He flung his head back to look up at her, fluffy green locks flipping backwards as he tilted his head to look up at her, his eyes seeming to well up with-

Harper blinked rapidly, eyes widening.

Were those _tears?!_

 _"_ What am I feeling?" PAMA asked, beseechingly, as clear liquid began to trickle down his cheeks. "I don't know why-" His shoulders shook and he suddenly hiccuped. "I don't know why I'm _feeling_ this-"

Harper blinked down as PAMA crawled up, her heart crawling into her throat as the what-seemed-to-look-like-a-twelve-year-old scrambling upwards and flinging his arms around her in the tightest of hugs. "I wasn't _created_ like this, I wasn't _created_ to feel like this, why am I _feeling_ these- these _emotions_ -"

"Oh- oh, c-calm down, PAMA, c-calm down, alright," and Harper quickly patted him on the back, the kid's grip tightening on the backs of her robes with each bewildered pat. "I'm sorry!" he was crying harder. "I must have been bad... making everything useful... because when I came back... I got all of these _feelings_ and I don't-" A childish WAIL tore out of his mouth. "I'm sorry, Creator!"

"PAMA, p-please stop c-crying-" Harper was cut off as the kid that seemed like PAMA began to sob even harder than before. "I don't want to be feeling these feelings!" he bawled.

Harper's eyes widened even more, and there may or may not have been tears beginning to fill her own eyes.

Going unnoticed once again were a pair of glowing white eyes that lurked behind a spire of rock. They blinked once, before disappearing in a curl of black smoke.

 _Two._

* * *

 **A/N: Oh wow. PAMA's acting like a little kid. I guess that being brought back to life by Herobrine as a hybrid gave him human emotions? I guess he DOES have a conscience...?**

 **Next chapter or so will be very fun for me to write x3 they're more like fillers but I feel like you'll like 'em too?**

 **RQTC: Would you rather have Nariko, Ebony, or PAMA as a smol friend?**

 **I would have PAMA... I wrote him too much as a smol cinnamon bun with a conscience, hehe xD**

 **ChoyofBonk: (innocently looks at the ceiling) No spoilers. And Aiden and Cassie are humans, too... just make all of the animals in the game humans lol xD**

 **RapidSammi: Heehee x3**

 **Luna96: (snickers) Yes, Aiden and the Dou- I MEAN Blaze Rods, totally was saying Blaze Rods, no idea what y'all are talking abouuuuut :3**

 **LivtheWarrior: (wiggles eyebrows)**

 **S4SH4L4SH4theGaMeR101: Can't wait to write more :3**

 **J.M.M: BING BANG BA-DA-BING-BOOM xD you're welcome**

 **LittleAngelbun: Noice :3**

 **Choco: Yep, totally x3**

 **Toni42: NO SPOILERS TONI-KUN xD**

 **x.X. A.L. X.x**


	10. Don't Know What to Think

Harper looked at the sleeping bundle of what _might_ be a computer-hybrid snuggled up on the bed next to her.

She wasn't sure how she was supposed to feel about this.

On one hand, she wanted to chuck the kid who-might-be-PAMA into a lake before it could do any more damage...

...but on the other hand, this PAMA... well he was only a _kid._ He looked like he wasn't any more than _twelve._ She couldn't do something like that to a _kid_.

Not to mention that _this_ PAMA hadn't done anything _wrong_ yet. In fact, upon exiting the cavern, tear stains all down his face from pretty much bawling his eyes out all over her robes, he'd run around trying to help the villagers and had even fought a zombie off (he'd tripped and Harper had had to smack it with her wrench to kill it).

He'd beamed whenever a townsperson had thanked him for helping (although they'd looked a bit confused at the sight of him), and cheered, "I was useful!" before running off to help the next one. Eventually, he'd started cheering, "I was helpful!" between the "I was useful" cheers. Harper had finally just left the kid alone and hoped she wasn't making a mistake in doing so.

Of course, he hadn't _done_ anything (well, anything wrong, she meant), and was now ensnared in a bundle of blankets and humming as he breathed while asleep, fluffy waves of green hair dangling in his eyes. She _had_ noticed that upon being alarmed of her presence, his hair had turned blood red, and his eyes had started reverting, but when he was crying or calm his hair and eyes were green. It was an interesting little quirk she'd noticed about the kid.

He turned over and rolled closer, and Harper had to quickly duck down from where she was perched in her chair and push a bit so that he wasn't falling off the bed.

"Mm... thanks... M... om," PAMA hummed, completely asleep, before rolling over the next way and humming again.

Harper froze a bit, eyes widening a little bit as she watched the little kid breathe steadily in his sleep, before her brain slowly became more capable of processing what was going on right now.

Had-

Had PAMA just called her...?

Her mouth finally twitched into a sad little smile as she stared at the little kid, eyes feeling suspiciously full.

Okay, she _definitely_ wasn't sure how she was supposed to feel about this.

She just hoped that Jesse didn't mind having another brother.

Yes, that was a joke.

... sort of.

Maybe.

...

 _Darn it, Cassie, you just_ had _to joke that Ivor and I were dating..._

* * *

"Um, Ms. Ellegaard...?"

Ellegaard, who'd been checking one of her machines, jumped six feet into the air at the sudden voice and dropped her wrench on her foot. Biting back several swears, she looked up to see Nariko standing there and blinking at her.

"Ahh... h-hello," and Ellegaard winced before gingerly setting her foot back down. It didn't help that this was the foot she'd hurt from the Witherstorm whacking her into Olivia way back when; it still got injured a little too easily. Which got extremely inconvenient at times. "D-did you need something?"

"Ah, yes, actually, do you know any good books? Ebony is reading and I want to sit with her for a bit," Nariko said, rubbing her head, "but I don't know any good books..."

"Oh," and Ellegaard straightened back up, limping towards the doorway. "Yes, c'mon, this way-" she winced again as she accidentally put more weight than she was meaning to on her bad foot.

Something wrapped around her waist, and Ellegaard had a full second to contemplate what was happening before both feet left the ground and she yelped in surprise. She twisted in midair to see a black tentacle ensnared around her waist and a supremely surprised look playing on the Witherstorm hybrid's face.

"I- um- sorry," and she gently set the redstone engineer back on her feet, the black tentacle slithering back out of reach and snaking back out of sight on her back as she rubbed the back of her head sheepishly. "Do you need help getting to the library, or-?"

Ellegaard had regained her composure. "I- uh, no, I'm okay, thank you, though."

Nariko bowed slightly, a relieved expression on her face. "Okay then. I'm sorry about startling you."

"I-it's okay."

Ellegaard gave her head a discreet little shake as she headed towards the library.

She _still_ didn't know how to feel about their two newest guests.

Steve and Alex were fine- actually, she liked them both; they seemed a bit like Jesse. Steve was actually like a funny mix of Jesse and Jace combined, and Alex was a combination of Jesse and Petra (except, you know, without wolf ears and spider arms and Blaze Rods).

But Ebony and Nariko...

Well...

Ebony was the reincarnation of the _Ender Dragon_. The _Ender Dragon._ The entity which had nearly _killed_ them all- it was only Soren's quick reaction and slight 'cheating' that they were even still alive today. She didn't know _what_ she would've expected from this dragon-hybrid; maybe a lower voice or maybe even a more violent behavior.

But besides the 'breathing fire' incident from earlier, Ebony was actually rather quiet. She seemed to _really_ like reading, which Ellegaard would never have expected from the Ender Dragon hybrid, and she was kind and oddly serene.

So there was that.

Add in Nariko, the reincarnation of the _Witherstorm_ , who had nearly killed _everyone_ \- forget just the Order, the Witherstorm had nearly destroyed the entire world in its process of eating up the whole world- who was quiet, and shy, and seemed extremely eager to please everyone- and Ellegaard felt like she was going to _faint._

She hadn't expected _this._

Opening the doors to the library, she gave the books a cursory glance, before grabbing a book of old fairy tales, the B.O.A. journal, and another book of Soren's, before pivoting rapidly and setting the books in Nariko's arms. "Here, these might be good."

"Oh... alright. Thank you, Ms. Ellegaard." And Nariko bowed politely, a smile appearing on her face, before she trotted over to the armchair Ebony was curled up in, the Ender Dragon hybrid waving a bit upon spotting the curly-black-haired girl, plopping into place beside her, and starting to read the B.O.A. journal, flipping through the pages until she reached the beginning.

Ellegaard gave her head another slow shake before slowly backing out of the library.

She _really_ didn't know what to think about their two newest guests.

Somewhere behind her in the hallway, a pair of glowing white eyes blinked out of existence from where they'd been watching.

 _One._

* * *

 **A/N: One last filler.**

 **RQTC: Have you ever gotten obsessed with a song before? If so which one?**

 **I got obsessed with 'To the Ends of the Earth' by NateWantstoBattle...**

 **Toni42: Heehee x3 Yep, I elaborated. And eee :3**

 **NoItsBecky: Teehee x3**

 **x.X. A.L. X.x**


	11. Odd Looks

Ebony wasn't sure she liked the strange looks.

More from the 'Original Order of the Stone' as Jesse had called them- they seemed more wary of her than any of the other new guests, although Nariko seemed to be a pretty close contest as well.

She knew that they weren't purposely doing it in front of her- in fact, whenever she _did_ spot the strange looks, they quickly composed their faces into a calmer sort of look, presumably so she didn't notice. But she _did_ notice.

She didn't know _why_ they were giving her the weird looks- in fact, if any of them should be giving everyone else strange looks, it should be her.

Ebony should've been giving the redstone engineer strange looks for trying to build a redstone machine that shot arrows at her.

She should give the bald griefer odd looks for throwing a block of TNT at her and detonating it right in her face.

She should've looked at the warrior funny for trying to kill her with a flashing diamond sword.

She should be giving Ivor- was that his name?- the potionologist a strange look for throwing potions at her and making glass burst and spray against her scaly, leathery back.

She should be giving the ginger strange looks for trapping her in what everyone had been calling the 'Ender Egg', trapping her in there for what had felt like an eternity.

But she wasn't.

And they were.

And she didn't know why.

Ebony let out a loud, sudden sigh, puffing a stray lock of black hair out of her violet eyes and decisively shutting the book she'd been trying to read for ten minutes straight now but not seeing a single word.

She _was_ sure that she was going to figure it out, though.

* * *

Nariko didn't know if she liked the looks people were giving her.

Ellegaard had looked at her with something that seemed like... vague _fear_ when she'd picked her up using the black tentacle, which she hadn't even known she'd _had_. Reuben had been trying to hide behind Jesse, definite fear playing in his eyes. And she definitely saw the fearful looks the Hybrid Order would send her, not to mention the Original Order's. She saw the fearful looks that they tried to hide far too easily.

She didn't know why they were afraid of her, either.

Had she done something to them in the past?

Had she hurt them somehow?

Nariko didn't really know if she had. Her past was a vague blur in the back of her mind; one that remained stubbornly out of reach no matter how hard she reached for it, how much she wanted to remember it.

She remembered bits and flashes. Bits and flashes of screaming, of flying indigo lights, of the wind washing over her, of tiny black... _creatures_ trying to pick her apart persistently, their screeching faint and distant. Of explosions, of pain exploding through her chest, of people running, far below.

Away from her.

She didn't know if she had liked scaring people in the past. If she had liked seeing her fear.

Nariko let out a low sigh, letting her back hit the door she'd just shut, slowly sliding down until she was hugging her knees to her chest, head resting on the door as she stared up at the sky, something hot and wet pricking the corners of her eyes.

But what she did know was that she definitely didn't like it now.

* * *

PAMA didn't like the wary looks everyone gave him.

Sometimes when trying to help one of the townspeople, they'd stare at him nervously, before tentatively allowing them to help.

He knew he'd made everyone useful before. Controlled them, made them do what he thought was efficient.

And he knew that he must've done something wrong.

It made him hurt a lot, now.

Whenever he tried to think about making others useful now, a hot spike would go stabbing through his chest, and he had to stop thinking about it, he had to stop because it hurt so much and his eyes filled with tears whenever he tried.

But helping others- _being_ useful- well, he didn't seem to mind that as much.

Having _emotions_ was a whole new ballpark for him- he'd feel a flush of pleasure when someone thanked him, or horribly upset whenever he tried to think about making others useful, or a happy glow whenever he talked to his Creator.

Well, that didn't seem like the right word for her now. His creator didn't just create- she cared for him, and others, and she helped him out whenever he needed it. She never did repairs on him anymore, and sometimes she'd give him a quick hug.

So perhaps the right word was that she was his... mom?

That felt accurate. That _sounded_ accurate. It sounded _good_. Harper was his mom. Mom, mom, mom. Mom was a fun word to say.

"Mom," and he looked over as the dark-skinned, white-haired woman approached him tentatively. "Y-yes, PAMA?"

He held up her tool box, making the metal tools rattle around in the metal box. "I brought your tool box!"

Harper looked at it for a moment, before a slow smile spread over her face and she gently took it from him, reaching out her free hand and patting him on the head, making his green eyes light up slightly. "Thanks, PAMA."

He did like this, though.

* * *

A pair of glowing white eyes surveyed them patiently, before its owner's mouth slowly twitched into a smirk, a white glint of teeth showing in the darkness that surrounded him.

The black smoke that surrounded him slowly began to condense, curl, grow until it became threateningly large around him, curling and waving everywhere in the faint breeze.

 _Zero._

 _Ready or not..._

His sadistic smirk grew to an insane size, until he was practically grinning ear-to-ear.

 _ **Here I come.**_

* * *

 **A/N: Three, two, one... action.**

 **Next chapter. x3**

 **RQTC: Who's your least favorite main character ignoring Jesse? (Petra, Olivia, Axel, Reuben, and Lukas)**

 **Mine would have to be Axel... because out of all of them I rate them in terms of liking them in the order of Lukas, Reuben, Petra, Olivia, and then Axel.**

 **Nothing against the dude, I just don't love him xD He is literally my 'least' favorite.**

 **LivtheWarrior: I did not know my stories caused death-inducing experiences xD**

 **rebekahtpe: Waterfalls. Waterfalls are bae.**

 **Toni42: Jeez. 0-0 And that _may_ be due to the fact that I'm currently not in the US xD**

 **J.M.M.: Just a bad joke xD**

 **S4SH4L4SH4theGaMeR101: Heehee x3**

 **RapidSammi: True, true. x3**

 **NoItsBecky: That may or may not have been my intention xD**

 **LittleAngelbun: Nice x3**

 **Angelwings: Yes, you did x3 and nice**

 **: I don't know where that came from but cool! Me likey :3**

 **x.X. A.L. X.x**


	12. Ready or Not, Here I Come

Night was falling; as evidenced by the groans of zombies and the clacking of skeleton bones that were starting to... um... well, start up outside. Jesse was ready to go to bed; it had been the most hectic day she'd had in _ages_. Several months, to be precise; ever since the end of the Builder Games and getting home for the first time in four months.

Of course, though, the universe had different plans for her and her friends.

"Uh, Jesse?"

The black-haired spider hybrid turned to see Axel standing in the doorway, looking oddly _pale_. "Oh, hey Axel. What is it?"

Axel opened his mouth to say something, but paused for a minute before just feebly beckoning. "C-come here."

Jesse blinked before moving towards him, stepping into the hallway. "What's up?"

He gestured at the huge window, which Steve was standing at, his tan skin looking almost like milk, his hands strangling the windowsill as he stared out of the window with wide eyes. "He's- he's just been _standing_ there for several minutes now..."

"Steve? Hey, dude, what's wrong?" Jesse approached him, concern actually shooting through her. "What's w-"

Steve suddenly pivoted on the spot and lunged at her, hands wrapping around her throat and crushing her windpipe with sudden, incredible force, cutting off her both confused and shocked scream off abruptly. His eyes were a strange, glowing white color, and a whispering started to fill Jesse's ears as she gasped for breath, struggling to drag air in through her crushed windpipe, an extremely enticing, hypnotizing voice swirling into her mind over Axel's screams.

 _Come on..._

 _Join me..._

 _Help me take over this pathetic world..._

 _Help me..._

 _ **Join me...**_

"NO!"

Her windpipe suddenly was freed, and she plummeted a few inches before staggering backwards into the wall, her head banging into it and ricocheting off the wall. She shook her head to clear the daze had started filling it, looking up to see Steve clutching at his head and shaking it, eyes flickering between white and blue, tears filling his eyes. "NO! _NO, NO, NO! GET OUT OF MY HEAD!_ " he screamed at the top of his lungs, collapsing to his knees.

Alex skidded into the hallway and glanced out the window, her own green eyes widening. She proceeded to unleash a vehement swear and grab the curtains, yanking them shut as tightly as she could.

"What-" Jesse let out a choking sound as she heaved air into her lungs, chest rising and falling over and over as she tried to breathe properly and compose her scrambled mind. "What just _happened?!_ "

Steve was on his hands and knees, his entire body shaking violently. Lukas skidded into the hallway, claws leaving marks on the wood floor. "Jesse?! Holy heck-"

He was cut off by Soren skidding around the corner and tripping over him, knocking the both of them into a dog-pile. Olivia bleeped into the room, before nearly getting thrown out of the way by Ivor as he bolted in, checking Jesse over frantically. "Jesse? Oh my goodness are you alright did you get hurt-" Reuben followed a second later, making this odd keening sound in a hot panic as he ran over to Jesse.

"Ivor, I'm-" Jesse coughed a bit, rubbing her now-rather-sore throat a bit. "I'm fine... Steve?" she looked up at him as Ebony and Nariko rounded a corner, Ellegaard, Magnus, Gabriel, Hadrian, Mevia and Jace skidding around another one and all of them running into each other and knocking them all into the wall and then to the floor; followed by Petra blasting in there (literally, there was a small trail of smoke in the air behind her, and she was sparking furiously), all of them looking panicked by Jesse's scream.

Steve was shaking, before he finally lifted his head again, obvious tears welling up in the corners of his back-to-blue-eyes. "Herobrine's... back," he managed, shaking even harder as he turned his head to see Alex there, the redhead looking very obviously upset. "I know. I saw."

"Who?" Jesse wasn't the only one who asked this- a good deal of, oh, just _everybody in the hallway_ asked the same question, almost simultaneously, too.

"See for yourself," Alex said simply, before reaching out and yanking the curtain back open again.

Jesse swivelled her head to see, before her eyes widened to the point where it looked like her irises were red-and-green pinpricks in the center of the whites. Standing- well, hovering- outside the window was someone who looked like Steve, but with glowing white eyes and surrounded by a curling cloud of smoke, the smoke pressing up against the window. For some reason, Lukas's face had gone a shade of pure _white_.

"That's Herobrine," Alex responded, but Jesse wasn't listening anymore- she could hear an enchanting whisper snaking its way into her mind.

 _Come on..._

 _Join me..._

 _You know you want to..._

 _"Shut the damn curtains!_ " screamed Axel, his hands clamped over his ears, face screwed up furiously in concentration. He wasn't the only one- Ebony and Nariko were on their hands and knees, just like Steve, Olivia was shaking her head so hard her curly black hair was whipping her in the face as an Enderman-like screech was emitting from her throat, Petra was sending flames and sparks and smoke spitting all over the place and accidentally setting Mevia's robe on fire (Mevia swatted at it rapidly in an attempt to put it out), and Jace looked _supremely_ uncomfortable, clinging to his head, tail tucked between his legs and ears flattened against his head.

Alex turned back around to see 'Herobrine' giving her a growing smirk. She gave him the finger and yanked the curtains shut again. "Where's the most secure room in the house?" she asked, eyes hardening.

"That would be the basement," Ivor said, raising his hand a little bit.

"Alright, quick- down there, lock all the doors- not that'll it'll do much good," she grumbled under her breath, "and we'll do our best to explain and figure something out, all right?"

Soren hesitated, before his eyes hardened, and the ginger straightened up and gave her a salute. He scooped Lukas up, the ocelot looking bewildered and worried at the sight of his friends in pain, and bolting down the hallway. It didn't take long for everyone else to follow suit, until the only two people remaining by the window were Alex and Steve. The redhead stared after them with hard, worried eyes, before glancing at Steve. "How long do we have?"

Steve was shaking in pain, but he managed to lift his head enough to meet her eyes, a trickle of sweat moving down his face. "10 minutes."

"... that'll have to be enough," Alex grumbled, before reaching down and helping him to his feet, one arm draped around her neck. "C'mon, man- we can make it, alright?"

Steve's voice had gone so low that the redhead could barely hear it, but he nodded weakly. "O... kay..." he grunted, voice cracking.

Alex nodded, before double-timing it down the hallway as fast as she could.

Outside the house, Herobrine felt a smirk creep over his lips.

Slowly, ever creeper, zombie and skeleton within a mile of the house turned their heads, eyes glowing pure white as they turned to see the hovering figure.

"Go _get them_."

He slowly turned back to the shut window, raising one hand and making the curtains fly open violently, ripping right off of the curtain rod and falling to the floor uselessly. His smirk grew to beauty pageant proportions, white teeth and white eyes the only clearly visible things through the black smoke obscuring his face.

"Oh, you _foolish_ hybrids..."

A strange chuckle.

" _I'm not a fan of hide and seek._ "

* * *

 **A/N: Welp I made this way creepier than I intended it. That's what I get for reading the Creepypasta wiki to see what 'One Man Hide and Seek' is. By the way, the actual ritual is creepy af. Welp, hope you liked the chapter anyway! Alex and Steve have a lot they need to explain after this, don't they. xD**

 **And the action has officially begun.**

 **RQTC: What is the creepiest creepypasta you've ever seen?**

 **There's one called 'Elevator Safety Guidelines' that I found creative, but definitely the creepiest one is the 'One Man Hide and Seek'... that stuff is _creepy._**

 **ChoyofBonk: (shrugs) We'll see :3**

 **S4SH4L4SH4theGaMeR101: No spoilers! xD**

 **Guest: Ahhh that sucks :/**

 **Luna96: Ahh, I see.**

 **Choco: Noice :3**

 **LittleAngelbun: 'Eyyyy (high five)**

 **RapidSammi: (hops around)**

 **J.M.M.: No problemo :3**

 **TheRealRedGaming: Gotcha :3**

 **NoItsBecky: Now this xD**

 **NightShadeNinja: (thumbs up)**

 **x.X. A.L. X.x**


	13. Time's Up

**A/N: HAPPY NEW YEARS!**

 **(Petra blows one of those little noisemakers and both Jesses do jazz hands)**

 **Sorry it's late; I was on a plane for like 18 hours straight xD The jet lag is so real right now, though...**

 **I also managed to listen to Undertale the Musical for, I am not kidding you, the entire 18 hours. CURSE YOU NOITSBECKY NOW I WANT TO MAKE AN UtM x MCSM CROSSOVER STORY FOR NO REASON GRRRRR**

 **Well, anyway, I literally listened to the SAME SET OF SONGS for 18 hours. I have no idea how. (Also didn't sleep. That didn't help my jet lag xD)**

 **Anyhoo, onto the story!**

* * *

Ivor slammed the basement door shut and made to lock it when Alex stopped him, laying her hand absentmindedly on his. "Don't; we'll need it open in case we need to beat a hasty retreat."

The potionologist, who usually would've snarked at the redhead, simply meekly nodded and edged back from the door.

"Okay, so what in the name of Notch and Jeb and everything good and holy in this world is Herobrine?!" Magnus demanded, flailing his arms around and nearly smacking Axel in the face a bit by accident. He _very nearly_ also made the creeper hybrid explode in everyone's face.

To everyone's surprise, it wasn't Ivor, or Soren, or even Steve or Alex that picked up- it was Lukas. "He's this children's story here in our world- also known as the 'Great and Powerful One'. He can control monsters, sometimes people, and he can even bend reality to his will."

Nariko picked up, one finger twirling through her curly black locks as she stared anxiously around the dark room at all the occupants, her face and indigo eyes illuminated eerily and dimly by potions and torches and glowing letters from the enchanting book. " _The Great and Powerful One's desire to rule the world proved to be his demise, as a group known as the 'Authors' managed to take him away to a different world, far away from this world that exists here. But his powers and his ability to bend reality itself to his every whim and desire will not be suppressed. Eventually, even if it takes him a thousand years, he will make his way back here. He will make his way back to this world, this crossroads between worlds, and he will take it over again_ ," she quoted from the book, before glancing at Lukas, her cheeks flushing pink slightly. "I-is that accurate? Did I get the general gist of it?"

"Word for word," Ebony said calmly, only looking slightly discomfited from the sensation of Herobrine.

Steve was still pale and sweaty, but he managed a sarcastic, frail laugh. "A children's story... so that's how people decided to write it."

Hadrian cleared his throat slightly, making everyone look at the purple-clothed Old Builder, his expression faintly uncomfortable. "You're saying that this story- what Karaka-"

"Nariko-" Everyone in the room automatically corrected. Even Mevia began to correct it before pausing and looking down at her lap, pursing her lips together. Hadrian chose to ignore this and continued, "just quoted- that's a true story? It actually happened?"

Alex let out a faint, sarcastic chuckle. "An extremely abridged version to avoid scaring all the kids, but yes- it happened. It happened a while ago, but it did happen."

"The... Authors, did you say? Who are they?" Olivia questioned, one eyebrow arching as her magenta eye gleamed in the dimness of the room.

The original Order of the Stone, the Old Builders (well, the members that were currently present, at least), and Steve and Alex exchanged looks. Gabriel finally spoke up, still staring at his friends. "The Authors are a group that nobody knows how old they really are; although they all look like teenagers. They've been around since before the Order of the Stone or even the Old Builders were around."

Mevia picked up, staring at the back of her hands with a steadily-becoming-sterner look. "They were said to have power over the elements that make up books and novels and things like that- that's why they were called 'The Authors'. I don't know the truth about that, though- never met them. Herobrine's defeat is so long ago that I didn't even remember that children's story."

Steve picked up, wheezing faintly as he struggled to keep himself upright against the wall. "They sort of... split up? It wasn't like they actually split up; they just don't work together all that often anymore- you know," a faint grunt and chuckle as his feet scrabbled at the floor frantically, "a hundred years or so is enough to make people just... grow apart.

Everyone in the room shared a look, before Jesse tentatively voiced what everyone was thinking. "So- would they be able to help us make Herobrine... go away?" she asked, lower arms fidgeting as she stared at the two of them, Steve hugging his midriff and panting heavily while Alex stood with her arms crossed as she leaned against the door.

The two of them exchanged a look, before nodding, Alex's pretzel-knot of her arms tightening and Steve's wheezing becoming more audible. "But we'd have to go find all six of them; and it's not safe to go alone."

Jesse's eyes lit up before Alex had even finished the sentence. "Ooh! We could get our other friends to come help get them, too! I'm sure they'd be willing to come!"

Steve considered that for a minute, his breathing still ragged. "How... many... would that be, then? With... all of them looking?"

Jesse's brow furrowed and she started counting off on her fingers, glancing around the room as her green-and-red orbs flickered around the room rapidly. "Hm, lemme see- there's me, Jace, Lukas, Petra, Olivia, Axel, Reuben, the original Order, so that makes five more, Hadrian and Mevia, you two, Nari and Ebony," she began to rattle off, fingers ticking off up to eighteen already in one go, "Isa, Reginald, Milo, Benedict- well, Benedict is a chicken? Sooo I don't think she counts?"

"Isn't Benedict a boy's name?"

"The Blaze Rods, Cassie, Harper, Otto, Em, Slab, Nell, and I think that's enough for one go, so that would be around 30 people? Yeah, 30," and Jesse looked back up from literally every single finger on her hand splayed out.

Everyone blinked at Jesse, before Jace cleared his throat, his tail twitching. "I think that's a good idea- we could split up into groups of five to get them, then."

"Yeah, okay," Petra agreed, tapping her foot rapidly against the table, "so who's going where to get who?"

"Well, I think Alex and Steve should be in a group... I guess I could go with them, and maybe Jace and Reuben?" Jesse suggested, moving her hands around to gesture at the five people she was indicating.

Ellegaard nodded, her eyes narrowing as she started calculating. "Well, then I suppose Magnus and I could go together, and we could take... Soren, Gabriel, and Gill?" she suggested.

"Why Gill?" Magnus questioned, with a glance at Ellegaard.

"I don't know, I just picked a random member of the Blaze Rods..."

"Oh."

"Well that works," Soren intervened before they could all get distracted by the conversation.

"Axel and I can go in a team, and we can take Lukas, Petra, and... um..." Olivia trailed off, fidgeting with her fingers and glancing around thoughtfully, magenta eyes flickering everywhere. "Um... Cassie?"

"That works- then Harper, Ivor, Isa, Nariko, and Ebony can all go in one team as well," Jesse quickly suggested, fidgeting with her fingers and her lower arms starting to play a game of Cat's Cradle.

"Mevia, Otto, Nell, Emily- er, 'Em'," Hadrian suggested, reluctantly, as evidenced by the way his brow hardened, lips twisting to the sides a bit in faint distaste, "and I could all be on a team?"

"Alright, so that leaves Milo, Reginald, Aiden, Slab, and... Maya," Petra finished, counting them off on her fingers.

"That sounds good," Jesse said, clapping her hands together decisively, green-and-red eyes hardening bravely, moving over so that she was standing next to her team. "Now, where do we go find the Authors?"

Before anybody could answer this _very_ pertinent question, there was a strange popping sound, and black smoke started curling through the room, making it get even darker. Everyone went extremely still, before slowly turning to their lefts and raising their heads.

A pair of glowing white eyes and a sneer that revealed white teeth leered out at them from within a cloud of black smoke.

" _Time's up._ "

* * *

 **A/N: Oh...**

 **These guys'd better get running for the temple.**

 **S4SH4L4SH4theGaMeR101: Haha xD indeed**

 **NoItsBecky: Don't read them unless you want nightmares... or at least very acute paranoia... xD And yes. Yes it did.**

 **rebekahtpe: Agh. You just gave me a paradox choice. I can never choose. Arggghhhh.**

 **Luna96: I'd probably pinch myself and go 'ow. Okay, I guess this isn't just a very realistic, blocky, Minecraft nightmare, then.'**

 **RapidSammi: Hehehe xD Sorry Sammi-kun.**

 **Toni42: Same here. :3 And it was my favorite part too!**

 **Choco: I can't wait either xD**

 **SmolGamerBean: No problemo :3**

 **lucykillrcassie: Hehehe x3**

 **ChoyofBonk: Yes, out of all of these guys he's getting the short end of the stick. Well, at least it's not Lukas this time xD**

 **LittleAngelbun: Fair enough :3**

 **angelwings: xD**

 **J.M.M.: Cool :3 Snow is great, and Happy New Years!**

 **(Petra uses the noisemaker again, and fireworks go off in the background, courtesy of Axel)**

 **Luna96: ... To finish the comic I'm working on, and stop publishing every little plot bunny popping into my head. xD**

 **HAPPY NEW YEARS!**

 **x.X. A.L. X.x**


	14. Run, Run, and Did I Tell You to Run?

"Run!" shouted Jesse, vocalizing what everyone was thinking. Olivia blinked out of sight in a spray of pink-and-purple sparks as Ivor rifled through his potion bag as Herobrine dropped to the ground from where he'd been hovering, making the ground shake as his feet hit the floor, before yanking out a potion and smashing it at everyone's feet.

Moments later, they bleeped out of sight, leaving no hint of their existence in the basement. Herobrine let out a dark chuckle, white eyes flashing through the dark smoke that surrounded him before blinking out of sight as well.

* * *

Jesse's feet slammed into grassy ground, and she staggered before dropping to all eights. There was a quick hissing sound from Lukas as he sucked in some breath, his ears pricking up and tail going ramrod straight. She looked at him, before looking around at their surroundings again and letting out her own hiss.

Spiders, zombies, skeletons, creepers- every possible malevolent mob that Jesse could picture off the top of their head, they were surrounding the large group standing there.

"Oh gravel," Soren groaned, his eyes widening to huge extents.

"Okay, change of plans," Olivia said suddenly, making everyone look at the dark-skinned Enderman hybrid, "we're all going to run to the temple at our own paces- just _stick with your group_ ," and she bleeped out in a spray of sparks, landing on the other side of the crowd of mobs, making a lot of them turn to look at her as the pitch and volume of her voice rose.

Axel glanced at the people nearest to him, which happened to be Hadrian and Mevia. "You might wanna stand back a bit..."

The two Old Builders quickly backtracked, before the burly creeper hybrid whipped back around and charged into the crowd of monsters, knocking straight into a zombie, his entire body flashing white violently-

At the last second, Jace's hair and ears pricked up. "HIT THE DECK!" he shouted, eyes widening. Jesse followed his advice and yanked Ivor down with her, everyone quickly dropping to the floor in a rush of motion.

Smoke blasted off of Axel as he exploded, making several other creepers detonate at the same time and blast a good portion of the monsters to dust, and also send large pieces of debris flying through the space where they'd all just been standing.

Axel charged out of the smoke that was rising towards the sky over to Olivia, gesturing frantically at Lukas and Petra to get over there. Lukas scrambled up a bit and then bolted after them, Petra's Blaze Rods forming before she shot forward to the group of four.

"C'mon c'mon c'mon!" Reuben yelled, yanking on Jesse's shirt, just as Steve let out a pained shriek and clutched at his head in pain. Black smoke exploded into being, the hovering doppelganger mere meters from them. This in turn sparked a load of screaming and running, Jesse throwing both Steve and Alex onto her back a bit uncomfortably and Jace literally scooping Reuben up before they bolted into the forest, undergrowth whipping them in the face as they rushed away.

Soren let out a very masculine squeak and pretty much towed Gabriel out of there, the warrior hopping a step before bolting after the ginger builder, Magnus literally scooping Ellegaard up bridal-style ("Hey!" she exclaimed, indignantly, but she was so terrified that she pretended this wasn't happening) and rushing after them.

A twenty-foot-wingspan worth of wings unfurled from Ebony's back, the short-black-haired female's legs tensing before she gave her wings a good, hard wave, launching her into the air like a projectile. A huge black tentacle shot out from Nariko's back and ensnared Ivor, the dark-blue-eyed potionologist yelping as it wrapped around him, before she shot into the air after Ebony and soared after the taller black-haired female.

Mevia let out a yelp and grabbed Hadrian, the purple-clothed man stumbling a step from the sudden movement before whipping around and running out of there at what was practically the speed of light. He was _fast_ for his age...

Several of the remaining mobs turned to look at Herobrine, Reuben noticed, as Jace was hightailing it out of there, their eyes gleaming white as they turned to look at the hovering man.

"He's controlling them!" the little pink-haired boy shouted to Jace. The wolf hybrid glanced back at Reuben. "What?"

The pig hybrid twisted from his position on Jace's back to see Jace properly. "Herobrine- he's controlling the monsters! That's the reason they're chasing us-" His eyes widened at the sight of several zombies lurching rapidly after them- and I mean _rapidly_. "RUN RUN RUN!"

"Ow- you just screamed in my ear!" Jace grumbled, but he picked up the pace, leaning forward into an outright sprint.

Herobrine suddenly appeared in front of Jace, the wolf hybrid's eyes widening as he processed that information, before throwing himself to the right, rolling several feet before scrambling back to his feet, tossing the pig hybrid onto his back as Herobrine's head pivoted on his neck to watch the brown-haired boy, before his legs and arms tensed. "Hang on, Reuben!"

"Hanging on- WOAH!" Reuben's fists had barely tightened on the wolf hybrid's gray armor before he was suddenly nearly thrown off by the speed of Jace's acceleration.

* * *

"Good thing Soren's not in our group," Ivor remarked as he looked down at the ground far below, scanning the few humans- or hybrids- mixed in amongst the much more abundant monsters.

"Why is that?" Ebony asked, glancing over at Ivor from where she was soaring, her wings generating its own good healthy wind as she soared along alongside Nariko, who was pretty much hovering around like Herobrine- or sometimes Petra, now that the potionologist thought about it.

"He's afraid of heights."

Ebony tilted her head to look down at the ground for a moment. "Oh." Then- "Why?"

"Why are you asking me?"

"You two are friends, aren't you?"

"Well, yes... or, well, no... well..." Actually, were they?

Wait-

"I-is now really the time to discuss this?"

"Good point."

Nariko seemed to smirk at that a bit, but when Ivor glanced at her more directly her face was definitely blank.

* * *

Herobrine smirked at the fleeing hybrids, watching them from where the wolf hybrid had literally thrown himself sideways to avoid the hovering entity. His eyes scanned the group of people. "Who shall I focus on?"

He scanned over the Old Builders... _Boring..._ over both of the Orders and Steve and Alex... _boring..._

His eyes slowly slid upwards to look at the flying dragon hybrid, the Witherstorm hybrid, and the ensnared potionologist as they flew across the sky.

His smirk grew until he looked utterly insane- not that that was an inaccurate description of the smoke-wrapped entity. " _Bingo._ "

* * *

 **A/N: Uh-oh...**

 **I can't wait until the Authors make an appearance, but that'll take a while. xD**

 **RQTC: Which FFN authors do you think the 'Authors' are? (actual Authors can 'guess', since I don't actually think I've mentioned who's an Author besides that person and me xD)**

 **ChoyofBonk: Headphones are great. xD**

 **NoItsBecky: Eee x3**

 **S4SH4L4SH4theGaMeR101: Yep, can't wait to write the next few chapters, either x3**

 **RattlesnaketheSandWing: I can't wait to write more! I'm glad you like this!**

 **SquiddytheBlaze: Hehe xD And yes, PAMA is a smol one. And NO PROBLEM xD**

 **FireBallin17: Ruby and Penny. x3 And what do you mean about me being a wizard?**

 **RapidSammi: Hehe xD**

 **Angelwings: Yeah, school sucks :/**

 **rebekahtpe: You can guess, I guess xD And lol, so you're saying Reuben can die? (raises eyebrow)**

 **J.M.M.: Nope, I was on a plane xD And... nice xD**

 **x.X. A.L. X.x**


	15. Sky- Land- Well, the City

Jesse had no idea where everyone else was, but after what felt like hours but was in fact only about ten minutes (according to Steve at least), they reached the temple. Jesse glanced back at Alex, who was perched further back on than Steve and hadn't quite 'locked on'. "Hey, Alex."

"Yeah?"

"Hold onto Steve tight, okay?"

Alex blinked before wrapping her arms around his waist, arms tightening as she noticed Jesse's limbs tensing. Jace bolted straight into the temple, beelining to the vines in the back, Reuben clinging onto her wolf-hybrid brother so tightly she was surprised Jace wasn't suffocating by now.

The redhead had barely processed this before she suddenly nearly fell of backwards off of Jesse as the black-haired spider hybrid catapulted herself into the upper room, skidding to a stop on the stone floor and wincing as her hand bounced a bit, as Jace struggled into the room, Reuben's shoulders shaking slightly as he tried to keep himself from falling off of Jace.

"A bit more warning next time?" Alex squeaked, her arms so tight around Steve's ribs that the man actually winced and shifted her arms so that they weren't cutting off his oxygen flow.

"Sorry, but we didn't have time for that," Jesse said hastily, before jerking her head at the glowing portal. Now that Alex thought about it, she'd never seen a portal like this- fancy gold decorations, what looked like some sort of white substance embedded in the gold, a blue swirling doorway... "Where does this lead?" she asked curiously.

"Well, I _think_ it leads to Sky City, but I'm not sure- that's where we went last time, at least. Hang on!" and Jesse shot forward into the portal, Jace following seconds later. Alex squeezed her eyes shut as particles parted to allow them to get to wherever 'Sky City' was, clicking and sparking slightly as they bolted through-

Gravity suddenly took a vacation, as the group of five (save maybe Jesse, and even she squeaked in surprise a bit) started free-falling, plummeting through empty sky-

"Ow!" Alex rubbed her bottom from where she'd landed on it, Jesse spitting out a mouthful of dirt and Jace rubbing his stomach from where he'd landed on it, Reuben letting out an incoherent whine with his tongue stuck out, looking extremely uncomfortable, and Steve didn't look too happy about the abrupt landing, either.

"Where are we?" Alex looked around, before spotting what looked like a destroyed city past a weird structure that was pouring with lava. "Whoa, what happened there?"

"Long story," Jesse said simply, peeking over the edge with Steve still perched on her back, "okay, we're gonna have to jump again."

"WHAT?!" Alex wasn't the only one that said this- Steve, Jace, and even _Reuben_ looked shocked at this mild declaration.

Steve spluttered incoherently for a moment before flailing his hands out wide, eyes wide. " _Why?!_ "

"To get to Sky- well, the Land- well, the city," Jesse responded mildly, which really didn't explain anything to the other members of the group. Jesse's limbs tensed again, before she glanced at Steve. "Hang on, okay?"

"Wait, wait, what? Oh no- nonono, Jesse, please don't tell me you're going to juuuUUUUUUUUUUMMMMMMMPPPP-" Steve's voice rose into a sharp shriek as Jesse sprang forward and fell out of sight, the tan man that was clinging onto her back disappearing along with her.

Reuben and Jace exchanged a look, before Jace hopped after his sister, Reuben yelping as he fell along with the wolf hybrid. And soon Alex was the only person remaining on the island of land. (Well, island... there was a bridge leading to the destroyed-looking city.)

"... oh... fine." And she shakily got to her feet before hopping over the edge as well, momentarily feeling weightless before dropping past the island, gravity taking ahold of her and yanking her towards the floor at the highest speed possible. Alex felt her heart jump into her throat, but before she could scream twenty profanities, she spotted something that looked a bit like... a lake, through the clouds.

Adjusting her position in the air so as to land in the actual water rather than on the ground (which would probably hurt a lot) or in the lava (which would _definitely_ hurt a lot), she sucked in and then held her breath, before finally hitting the water.

It was like getting a slap to the face- it was _freezing_ cold. And Alex wasn't wearing anything except a tunic-like outfit. She hissed out twelve swears before paddling over to the side, Steve coughing up water and looking extremely freaked out while Jesse just spit out some water, her hair dripping so much that it looked like miniature waterfalls were pouring off of her long, now glossy black hair. Reuben and Jace were soaked as well, but Reuben was letting out a high-pitched whine out of nerves and Jace was coughing up water as well.

"Well," Alex panted out, struggling out of the water, her clothing feeling as heavy as sandbags, before collapsing forward and landing hard on her bottom next to a soaking-wet Steve, "that was... an experience." There were several ruder terms she wanted to use, but since she actually liked Jesse, she decided that was probably not the most diplomatic thing to do.

Jesse laughed a bit, rubbing her head sheepishly. "Ahaha, sorry... I keep forgetting people haven't been to the places where we have. Well, anyway, welcome to Sky City-" she gestured a bit with her extra arms.

"Oh- Jesse?"

Alex twisted from where she was sitting on the grass to see a surprised-looking young woman. Her long red hair dangled down to halfway down her back, green eyes wide with surprise as she adjusted the black-wire-rim glasses on her nose, a little calico cat balancing on her shoulder. "And Jace and Reuben? What're you doing here?" she asked, sounding curious.

"Oh, hey Cassie- we need to see Isa. Like, right now. It's important."

Jesse was interrupted moments later by a flap of wings, and Ebony, Nariko, and Ivor landed next to them, all of them bone dry. Oh, right- they could fly. Well, Ebony and Nariko could, at any rate. The tentacle retracted back out of sight, slithering its way off of Ivor.

"I hate you," Jace muttered darkly but jokingly, before coughing up some more water.

Ebony winced a bit and rubbed her elbow, Nariko grimacing slightly and looking at her feet. Jace seemed to realize he'd said something rude and his ears drooped, tail tucking between his legs in embarrassment. There was a moment of awkward silence, before Ivor glanced at Jesse, his slightly amused expression turning into a worried one. "Where're Soren and Hadrian and the others?"

"... oh. _Oh_. Um... they're not here yet," Jesse said, her own expression becoming more anxious.

"I think the only reason we got here so fast is because Herobrine started chasing us directly- we pretty much rocketed out of there at the speed of light," Nariko spoke, gesturing wildly with her hands.

Cassie glanced between Jesse and the others, her eyes beginning to narrow. "... okay, now I'm getting seriously worried. Hang out here for a bit, I'm gonna see if I can drag Isa over here-"

"If you can, get Milo, Reginald, and the Blaze Rods out here, too- we need all of them," Jace added, before coughing up another mouthful of water.

Cassie paused for a moment, before her lips pinched together and she smiled, looking faintly nervous. "Okay." She turned around and began to walk out of there briskly, before pausing and glancing back. "Oh- I'll bring you some towels, too."

"Thank you," Jesse called back, anxiety dancing in her eyes but relief playing in her expression.

The redhead smirked faintly before turning around and jogging off, breaking into a faster running pace moments later, her smirk fading.

If Soren- _Soren_ \- was coming here, along with what Cassie was pretty sure was _everyone_ \- and if Ivor was worried about _Hadrian_ of all people- then this must be extremely serious.

* * *

 **A/N: Uh oh, Ivor's worried about _Hadrian_... he's pretty damn worried.**

 **S4SH4L4SH4theGaMeR101: True that x3**

 **x.X. A.L. X.x**


	16. Summarize

In the ten minutes Cassie spent running around getting everybody (apparently Isa and Milo were especially busy in the meeting room), everybody else managed to show up- some looking a little worse for wear, some looking as though they'd bolted through a firestorm or something, but everyone alive and well. Except maybe for a couple of broken bones, but those were easily fixed by a Potion of Healing or two. Hadrian blinked when everyone looked _relieved_ that he was alive and well. Mevia looked pretty startled by this as well when Ebony patted her on the head with a small smile.

Isa, Milo, and Reginald were deep in a conversation when they arrived, Milo apparently not realizing the reason for getting dragged out of the meeting room (he'd been in the bathroom when Cassie 'dramatically burst in') but he greeted them all jovially upon realizing who it was. The Blaze Rods all averted their eyes or looked sheepish about it.

"It's a pleasure to see you all again," Isa said formally, before her lips quirked up into a smile, Benedict clucking contentedly in Isa's arms. "And to meet you," she added, nodding at Steve, Alex, Ebony, and Nariko. So, what do you all need?"

She'd barely finished the sentence when all eighteen-or-so of them started talking simultaneously.

"We really need your help-"

"It's a really urgent matter-

"Sorry for bothering you-"

"Herobrine's on the loose-"

"-trying to find the Authors-"

"-there's no time we can waste-"

"-he might be coming here now-"

"Is that a chicken...?" This one was courtesy of Reuben, who looked interested at the sight of the chicken, who turned her head and clucked at Reuben. The pig hybrid tilted his head, pink ears flopping over slightly as he did so.

"-ask for help-"

"- _please_ help us out-"

"Whoa, whoa!" Milo held up his hands in a 'stop/surrender/time-out' sort of motion, and everyone immediately fell silent at the blonde's _immensely_ confused look. He wasn't the only one- Isa was blinking at them all with this extremely bewildered expression, Reginald looked completely baffled, Aiden himself looked extremely dizzy from looking at everyone who'd been speaking, and Maya and Gill were exchanging immensely odd looks with one another. Cassie had this blank look on her face- I mean _completely_ blank.

"In English, please?" Maya requested upon turning back to the group, running a hand through her slightly-longer nut-brown hair.

Ebony raised her hand a bit, indicating that she'd like to speak, and Jesse nodded at her, smiling encouragingly. The Ender Dragon hybrid stepped forward and bowed slightly, tail curling around her leg. "Ah, hello... we need your help. A man- man? Entity? Ah, o-one of those- called 'Herobrine' is threatening the safety of our world- and possibly yours, and everyone else's..." she trailed off, tilting her head to one side. "W-we're trying to get a group called the 'Authors' to help us, but... we're trying to split into groups so we can get them all faster. W-we need your help..." she trailed off again, before twisting to see Hadrian, the nearest person in the area. The white-haired Old Builder blinked at Ebony's mild look. "Um, is that the general gist of it?"

Hadrian blinked before glancing at the group standing opposite the eighteen-person-party of people. "I- I think so," he responded, although he was still looking at the other group.

To his surprise, Cassie was nodding, her brow furrowing. "Yes, that legend does seem familiar... and you know, my life up 'til this point has been pretty damn crazy, so I would believe it if you told me he was real. Actually, I think I'd believe it if you said that unicorns that shot rainbows out of its horn existed."

This made several of the people in the grassy area smirk, Aiden actually covering his mouth with one hand to smother the uncontrollable grin spreading over his face.

"... but I don't know where the Authors are," Cassie finally finished, crossing her arms. "It's such a distant legend that there are literally sixteen different versions all over the place."

Steve and Alex shared a look before the tan boy stepped forward, tentatively lifting one arm in a wave. "Um, yeah, we... Alex and I," he indicated the redhead beside him and himself, "might actually have a general idea of it... well, of five of them, at least. The sixth one is a little..." he made a face, before gesturing a bit. "Vague."

"Yeah... well, we have an idea of it," Alex said, clapping her hands together in an attempt to be positive.

"Sorry, one quick- who are you four?" Gill asked, raising one eyebrow as he indicated Ebony, Nariko, Steve, and Alex.

"Oh, sorry-" Steve began, but Alex stepped forward, green eyes flashing dangerously. "I am the spirit of vengeance and death!" she hissed, making the bearded boy backpedal straight into Maya and plow the both of them to the floor and making Benedict let out an alarmed squawk.

Then she chuckled, running one hand through her red hair. "Nahh, I'm Alex. Nice to meet you."

"Yeah, we should probably introduce you guys," Jesse said, before her six arms went crazy pointing at all the various members of both groups. "Isa, Milo, Reginald, Aiden, Maya, Gill, this is Ebony, Nariko, Steve, and Alex," she said rapidly, indicating the people by their names, and then adding, "I hope you were listening the first time around because I am _not_ repeating all of that."

Aiden chuckled a bit, giving Lukas a faintly nervous look, but the blonde didn't send him a cold look for the first time in a while; he was too busy focusing on the whole situation in front of them.

Isa was silent for a moment, before letting out a sigh and nodding, setting Benedict down (the chicken ran over to Reuben, who crouched down to look at the chicken, tilting his head to one side childishly) and crossing her arms. "I think this is one request we cannot refuse. You said we were going to split into groups?" she asked, cutting right to the chase. "If this is that urgent, proper explanations can be given on the way."

"Oh- yes," and Soren clapped his hands together. "Gill, you're coming with me and the others."

Gill blinked at this, before nodding tentatively. Giving his friends a quick nod and smile, he moved over to where the Original Order were all standing, giving them a hesitant grin. Ellegaard returned it.

"Cassie's coming with us, right?" Olivia glanced at everyone, trying to confirm the fact, magenta eye flicking around at all of them.

"Correct," Gabriel responded, giving the dark-skinned girl a friendly nod. The Enderman hybrid smiled back weakly.

"Milo, Reginald, Aiden, Maya, and this gladiator called Slab- you'll have to meet up with him at the Builder Games- you're all teamed up together," Jesse added, as the two Blaze Rods smiled tentatively at each other and the two Sky City citizens exchanged faintly dark looks. You could practically see the lightning sparking between the two of them.

Alex clapped her hands together authoritatively. "So that's everyone here- we need to split up. Jesse and our group can go looking for Reese..." she trailed off, before shrugging. "Whatever. My point is we can look for her. Milo and his group should head with Hadrian and Mevia's first to go get the required members of their team... then Milo's can go look for Rosy Dozy, and Hadrian's can go get... Anton..." she hummed for a moment thoughtfully, "so then Olivia can go look for Veggie Girl, Ivor's group can look for Gymmie, and that leaves Ellie's group with Becky."

"Y'know, I'm _pretty_ sure all of them hate those nicknames, Lexi," Steve said pointedly.

The redhead shot him a look. "I forgot their real names," she said plainly, the boy slapping his palm to his face in a facepalm. "You're impossible," he told her, his voice a little muffled.

"Hey!"

* * *

 **A/N: Haha xD If you can correctly guess all of the authors that'll be in this story, you get Internet points. (Internet points are legally and monetarily worthless xD but whatever)**

 **RQTC: Can you correctly guess who the Authors are?**

 **RapidSammi: (laughs) And thanks, you too! Apologies for the lateness, haha xD**

 **Choco: Ahhh x3 I've never done either, so I wouldn't know how to do any of this xD**

 **ChoyofBonk: Glad you like it, friend!**

 **S4SH4L4SH4theGaMeR101: xD**

 **Lucykillrcassie: Yeah, he's not heartless xD and here's the quick explanation: Isa - good at fighting, good in emergencies (sometimes). The Blaze Rods - helpful in tight situations. Sometimes. xD**

 **x.X. A.L. X.x**


	17. Meet 'n' Greet

"So who are we looking for exactly?" Jesse asked Steve and Alex, scratching her head a bit as her lower arms started playing cat's cradle. Reuben was riding piggyback (hehe) on Steve's back, the tan man breaking off from his mild conversation with Jace to glance at the spider hybrid.

"Well, I don't remember her name... just her nicknames," Alex said sheepishly, making Steve snort. After sending him a sharp look, she finished, "And she's not exactly the _easiest_ person to find..."

"Well, I'm _pretty_ sure she hangs out at this cafe, sometimes... maybe..." Steve trailed off again, scratching his chin nervously. "Well, I mean, we haven't seen any of the Authors for two or three years, so I can't be sure..."

Jace shrugged, ears perking up. "Well, I mean, that doesn't sound too bad... where is this cafe?"

"Um, the thing is... it's _kinda_ far away... and by _kinda_ I mean _really..._ " Alex looked around the room once, sucking in a deep breath. "Well, actually, we're not sure if she'll be there. She kinda wanders around."

"... so how are we supposed to find her?" Reuben asked the question that was running through all their minds, all three members of the Hybrid Order (well, with the one honorary member since he was too young currently) staring at the two others.

"The cafe's currently our best bet, since if we head that way she'll either eventually go to the cafe or run into us," Alex pointed out, shrugging, when suddenly Steve pointed, making Reuben yelp as he scrabbled for a better grip. "There she is."

The redhead whipped around to see a distant figure with black hair and a red flash disappear into a green portal. "Wait, what?! Crap, we gotta go after her!" And Alex broke into a full-out sprint after the girl.

"Wait, Alex-!" Steve was cut off by a brown blur flashing past him on all fours, racing after the redhead. "Wait for us!"

Jesse let out a mix of an annoyed sigh and a groan, before dropping to all eights, all eight limbs bunching in a preparatory way. "Get on, then."

Steve quickly clambered onto Jesse's back, feeling his legs lock into place as he adjusted his position. He'd barely locked into place when he nearly fell backwards from the speed of Jesse's acceleration, the black-haired spider hybrid shooting forward like a bullet. He threw himself forward and basically flattened himself to her back, Reuben letting out a protesting squeak in surprise.

Alex skidded to a halt before darting into the gray portal after the black-haired girl that they'd spotted. Jace skidded so much that he literally fell over before bolting in himself. Jesse didn't skid, but cut precisely into the portal, disappearing with a low swooshing sound.

* * *

"Why do you think they called her Jimmie if she's a girl?" Ivor wondered, crossing his arms and arching his eyebrow.

"Actually, that might've been 'Gymmie', like going to the gym," Nariko corrected, crossing her arms defensively over her stomach. Isa nodded at Ivor's raised eyebrow, Benedict clucking contentedly in Isa's warm hug. "I think she's right, Ivor."

"Oh."

"So... aren't we supposed to head to Diamblade if that's the case?" Ebony pointed out hesitantly. "Or- was that the name of the place, or...?"

"No, no, that's the place- we still need one member, though," Ivor pointed out quickly, heading for the Crown Mesa portal. "Or did you not notice we were one person short?" He smirked slightly at his own sarcasm- Jesse would've smirked back and then snarked back at him.

The Ender Dragon hybrid returned the smirk, having noticed said sarcasm. "I suppose that's true. I suppose that's why we're heading to Crown Mesa?"

Ivor nodded and patted the redstone-lined portal wall, before bowing a bit sardonically. "Ladies first."

"Age before beauty," Isa responded, doing her own little bow (she would've curtsied, but then remembered at the last second that she was hugging Benedict) and smiling at Ivor to show him she didn't mean any harm.

Ivor put a hand to his chest, mocking being injured. "Ow. My feelings."

All four of them grinned, and even Benedict made this funny clucking sound that sounded remarkably like laughing, before Ivor himself stepped through the portal. There was a moment where he could still feel the floor beneath his feet, before suddenly it vanished and gravity took ahold, and the potionologist found himself plummeting at the sandy ground-

He tucked into a roll and managed to land on his feet. He grinned a bit in relief. "Hey, I did it without tripping this time." For a while, he'd been trying to perfect the move but couldn't do it without landing on his feet, staggering, and then falling flat on his face again anyways. He was getting better at it, though-

"Oh! Ivor?"

At the familiar voice, the potionologist immediately straightened up and turned. Harper was standing there, her gray eyes sparkling slightly with excitement and a smile beginning to spread over her face.

"Harper?"

The white-haired Old Builder tentatively stepped forward, before running over to him and stopping mere feet from him, her gray eyes definitely sparkling now. "Hello, Ivor," she said, but a grin was spreading over her face.

Ivor smiled back a bit, dark blue eyes softening. "Hello, Harper."

The two of them smiled at one another, unsure what to say, before they heard Cassie snicker behind Ivor. "Shut up, Redhead," Ivor told her, not even looking in her direction as his face pinked. Harper chuckled, her own cheeks going faintly pink. "Ah, yes, well... yes. Hello, Cassie. And... you... two?"

"Oh, yes," and Ivor turned to gesture at the two new hybrids, "Harper, this is Ebony and Nariko. Nariko, Ebony, this is Harper."

A little green-haired head popped up in front of Harper, and Ivor jumped six feet in the air before realizing it was a short kid, about Reuben's height, with silvery skin and acid-green hair, his own eyes also a strange green- the whites of his eyes were faintly green as well as the irises. "Hello!" he chirped, waving at all four of them, eyes sparkling, "can I help you?"

"Oh, I guess we have another introduction," Harper said, rubbing the back of her head sheepishly and looking down at the tiny boy bouncing on the balls of his feet in front of them all. Putting one hand tentatively on his shoulder (the boy looked ridiculously pleased about this fact), she raised her gray eyes back to Ivor, a hesitant look coming onto her face.

"Ivor, Cassie, Ebony, Nariko... meet PAMA."

* * *

 **A/N: Huehuehue x3 this will be interesting.**

 **Hints on the authors: Not all of them are the same authors from Minecraft: Hide and Seek Mode (which will be updated as soon as this story is caught up to speed, promise!). Some are, but some aren't. Also the author of Different isn't on here simply because I don't know him xD**

 **RQTC: Who do you think the Authors are now that I've given you the hint?**

 **LittleAngelbun: Hehe xD and not _quite..._ four of them are correct, but there are two more that you didn't get.**

 **ChoyofBonk: YASSSSS xD**

 **S4SH4L4SH4theGaMeR101: Hehe, more like 'parts' x3**

 **Luna96: Haha xD well, you're kind of close.**

 **FireBallin17: Oh xD Thank you.**

 **J.M.M.: Ahh, gotcha.**

 **TheRealRedGaming: You got four of them correct :3**

 **RapidSammi: All four are correct but you still are missing two xD**

 **RavenBlaze4850: Four of these answers are correct.**

 **Toni42: Pretty much, yes xD You can guess in the comments, y'know xD it's allowed.**

 **x.X. A.L. X.x**


	18. This break is brought to you by Baymax

"... _what._ "

Ivor's expression was so deadpan that the three girls shared faintly amused looks.

Said green-haired boy popped up right in front of Isa, making the black-haired woman jump back a whole step in surprise, Benedict squawking loudly in surprise as well. "Hi! I'm PAMA! Can I be useful? Can I help you?"

"Uh, yeah, PAMA went through a sort of... personality change," Harper chuckled to Isa and Ivor, running a hand through her long white locks. She was about to say more, but Nariko stooped down so that her one functioning indigo eye was on level with PAMA's odd ones. "Hello, PAMA. It's nice to meet you. My name is... well, it's not my _real_ name, but- I'm Nariko."

PAMA hopped up and down a bit in place, shaking her hand. "It's nice to meet you, Nariko," he said cheerfully.

Ivor stared at the small boy currently bouncing in front of Nariko and Ebony, both of the girls leaning down to get on his eye level. Then he slowly turned to Harper. "How?" was what he asked.

Harper looked at PAMA, her gaze softening as Ebony patted PAMA on the head, making the former computer brighten up with a happy grin and bounce around a bit. "... I don't know," she finally admitted.

"Looks like Jesse has another brother," Isa joked softly to Ebony, who turned to glance at her, blinking before getting the joke (on the way there, the three girls had been treated to an explanation of how Jesse and Ivor got along from Cassie before their groups split up to go find their specific people) and chuckling. Both the former Order of the Stone member and the Old Builder turned and glared partially jokingly at the black-haired woman, their cheeks flushing. "W-would you all give that a rest?!" Ivor hissed, doing his best to ignore Nariko and Ebony's titters. Harper just blushed severely at the floor.

"I thought you were better than this, Isa," Ivor teased slightly, crossing his arms and making the blush on his cheeks get even more severe. This just made all the younger women laugh at him kindheartedly. Even _Benedict_ seemed to be chuckling... or, well, clucking in a way that seemed a lot like laughter, at least.

Isa just chuckled in response. "Perhaps you're not a very good judge of character," she replied, voice filled with mirth.

"Oooh! You're Ivor!?" PAMA popped up right in front of Ivor, making the potionologist jump a foot into the air in shock. "Mom talks about you all the time! She tells me lots of cool stories about you!"

"I- ah- does she really?" Ivor stuttered out, his already rather severe blush deepening.

 _Cassie is never going to let this go when she hears about this, is she..._

* * *

"'Veggie Girl'. Interesting nickname," Olivia murmured, crossing her arms and arching her eyebrow.

"Well, this world that we're going to find her in sounds interesting, at least," Cassie murmured, arching her eyebrow and crossing her arms.

The ocelot hybrid next to her glanced up from where he was chatting with Winslow. "Oh, yeah- didn't they say it's some sort of puzzle place?"

"Well, they were more specific than 'some sort of puzzle place'," Petra joked, making the ocelot hybrid scowl at her playfully. The Blaze hybrid just stuck her tongue out at him in return, making Axel snort a bit.

"Three, two... okay, here's the place," and Cassie put her hands on her hips at the sight of the piston-lined portal, the pistons extended and blocking the doorway, several levers sitting on the wall next to it. "Huh, interesting choice of materials for a puzzle world. "Let's see..." she flipped one lever. Some of the pistons retracted with a clicking sound.

Through several bouts of trial and error (and some random toggling of the levers), they finally managed to retract the pistons so that it revealed a brownish, swirling substance within the doorway. Without another wasted second, Cassie stepped through, bracing herself for the fall that was sure to come a second or two later- and she wasn't disappointed.

"Ooof!" she yelped, bouncing slightly from where she'd landed on her bottom before flopping onto her stomach with a faintly pained grunt. "Well _ow_..."

She'd barely finished the thought when someone suddenly landed on her back, making her gasp in pain.

"Sorry! Sorry sorry sorry!" Lukas apologized, jumping up to his feet and hauling the redhead to her feet, Winslow hissing and clinging to Lukas's armor using his claws like some strange sort of bat.

"I'm alive, at least..." Cassie grunted in return.

"I said I'm sorry!"

Lukas would've protested more, except suddenly Axel toppled out of nowhere and landed right on top of the ocelot hybrid, making Winslow let out a yowl of protest as the three of them (the third member being Winslow) got flattened to the floor.

Cassie put her hands on her hips, a silly grin spreading over her face. "That's what you get," she told the blonde ocelot hybrid. He just let out a groan in response.

Olivia appeared in a spray of sparks next to her, and Petra glided to a halt next to the other redhead, making Cassie pout playfully at them. "I hate you both," she complained teasingly.

"Oh no. My feelings," Olivia teased back, placing her hand over her heart before the two of them laughed. Petra sniggered as well.

"Alrighty," and Lukas finally struggled to his feet, dusting himself off while Axel spewed a flood of apologies to him, waving it off (although Winslow looked distinctly upset about being squashed twice in rapid succession). "Now," and they all looked around at where they'd landed.

The place was filled with turning gears, smoke- no, steam- smoke tended to be gray, not white like this- and the metal pieces that rested everywhere had a distinctly rusty or old look to it, making it look oddly steampunk. There was a sign that indicated the city surrounding them all to be 'Ivorydenn', with a population of 40,782.

"I guess we should start looking."

* * *

 **A/N: Okay! I hope you don't mind being in a place filled with puzzles, riddles, and puns (you know who you are). To all the Authors who are in this story - (meaning I sent them a PM titled 'Hybrid sequel', not 'Glitch')- please indicate where you would like to be found in the PM. Another hint to those of you guessing who the Authors are- they are all authors who have A) written one MCSM story (at least) and B) are more prominent in the fandom.**

 **RQTC: Same as the previous chapter.**

 **ChoyofBonk: Kid-PAMA is best PAMA. (laughs)**

 **Choco: I will in... (checks) about 6 chapters xD and YE**

 **S4SH4L4SH4theGaMeR101: I was going to say, 'no spoilers' xD**

 **SquiddytheBlaze: (laughs) Thank you! and... haven't mentioned no death yet xD**

 **J.M.M.: Answer to what? And what review are you talking about?**

 **rebekahtpe: Heehee xD Um... thin one. I don't necessarily have to go outside in the thin white one... xD**

 **TheRealRedGaming: (laughs) Three are right, one is wrong.**

 **RapidSammi: Correct. (To those of you wanting to guess, don't cheat and look at her review... xD)**

 **GirlOfMyOwnWorld: True that (laughs)**

 **x.X. A.L. X.x**


	19. Anagram

"O... kay! So where do we start looking?" Cassie asked, putting her hands on her hips and looking around as Winslow retreated to her beanie. One of the spinning gears hovered right above them, making a shadow rather conveniently fall over them- it was rather sunny.

Axel scratched his head, looking around. "Uh, I don't know... we could ask around maybe? _Someone_ has to know where 'Veggie Girl' is... even though we don't know her real name... or what she looks like... ... this wasn't very good planning."

Olivia laughed at that, although she sheepishly rubbed her arm. "Ahaha. Yeah, I have to agree on that."

"Should we split up, then?" Petra suggested, running a hand through her choppy red hair, "it would go faster."

Lukas thought about that, tail twitching as his blue-green eyes narrowed. "Mmmm. Well, alright, as long as we stay within hearing distance of each other," he said finally, "I think it should go fine..."

"All right then," and they all split up.

Lukas headed for the nearest person he could find, a little kid with messy brown hair and who couldn't have been older than five playing with... he looked a bit closer. Yes, this kid was playing with a crossword book, lying on his stomach and scratching his head with the pencil. Huh. Ivorydenn appeared to be some steampunk puzzle/riddle town.

... cool.

"Hey, um, can I ask you a question?" he called out to the kid when he was about ten feet away, to avoid frightening him. The little kid looked up to see the blonde ocelot hybrid approaching, and sat back on his heels, a smile coming over his face. "Well, Mom says not to talk to strangers, but she never said not to talk to cats. So I can help you without any re- _purr-_ cussions."

"Wh...? Oh. Um. Yeah." Lukas coughed awkwardly at both the pun and the comment, rubbing the back of his head a bit sheepishly. "Well, um, do you know anyone called 'Veggie Girl'?"

"Huh...?" The kid looked blank for a moment, before perking up a few seconds later. "Oh, I think Mom said she doesn't like being called that."

"S-sorry, I don't know her name..." Lukas apologized to the kid, rubbing his head awkwardly.

"I don't either!"

... well, that's what he got for asking a little kid about this...

"I know a nickname most of us know her by, though- a lot of us call her BonkChoy. Like Bok Choy, but with a bonk instead of a bok." The kid giggled at the increasingly confused look Lukas was developing on his face. "Don't worry! It confuses us too. Us being children. The adults seem to know more about it; you should probably ask one of them."

The kid looked down at his crossword for a moment, in a lot of thought about this, before looking up at Lukas innocently, blinking his dark brown eyes up at the blonde ocelot hybrid. "You know, I could _probably_ help you more if you help me with this one crossword puzzle word. I can't figure it out."

Lukas blinked again, before rubbing the back of his neck. "Oh! I, um, okay then." He was pretty good at these most of the time, and more information definitely helped, so... why not. "What is it?"

"It's five letters across. The clue is: Mix cantaloupe citrus."

... _huh?_

Lukas stared at the kid, then at the crossword puzzle, before thinking about it slowly, lowering himself down next to the kid holding the crossword puzzle in his hands and staring at the page the kid was holding open for him, one hand going to his mouth thoughtfully.

Well, both were fruits... and 'fruit' had five letters in it... was 'fruit' the answer then?

No, it couldn't be, because 7 down went through the second letter, and there was an e in that spot. And 8 down had an 'n' in the fifth space. So it couldn't be fruit. It had to be _some_ sort of fruit, more specific then.

Was it melon? That was what a cantaloupe was, after all... and it had letters in the correct places.

No, wait... there was a second part to the hint: mix _cantaloupe_ and _citrus..._ cantaloupe and citrus... cantaloupe was a type of melon... so mixing melon and citrus...

"Lemon. It's an anagram of melon, from cantaloupe," Lukas said to the kid, his ears pricking up and tail flicking over the ground cheerfully, even though he somehow managed to keep a straight face.

"... oh yeah!" The kid scribbled in the remaining letters of 'LEMON' before beaming at Lukas. "Thanks, mister! So, what else do you wanna know?"

"Do you know how we can find... uh, BonkChoy?" This nickname wasn't much less awkward than the first one- was this girl vegetable themed?

The kid thought about it for a bit, before standing up and whispering in Lukas's ear as if it were some sort of huge secret, "She doesn't like to talk to people very much; she's not social. If you're asking one of the grown-ups, don't call her by the nickname- ask for the one who can recite the first 46 digits of pi."

Then he scooped up his puzzle book and skipped off, leaving Lukas to stare after him bemusedly as he crouched there on the ground.

"Hey, Lukas-"

He let out a startled yowl and jumped six feet into the air, Petra leaping back and emitting several sparks in shock. She rubbed her head sheepishly once she'd figured out what was happening, making her short red hair dance around and look even messier than it already did. "Ahaha, sorry, Lukas... did you find anything out? No one seems to know who this 'Veggie Girl' is."

"Well- I, actually, yeah," Lukas said, blinking and perking up upon processing what she was asking for, his bushy tail already beginning to relax. "Do you know a place where we could find some sort of inn or tavern or whatever exists in steampunk?" Lukas didn't read much steampunk manga, and he didn't really plan on starting.

Petra thought about it for a minute. "Hmmm... hang on a second; I know Olivia and Cassie got a better look around town than I did." She cupped her hands around her mouth and shouted, "Hey Olivia! Cassie!"

A pop and a shower of pink and purple sparks, and both females appeared, Cassie looking supremely uncomfortable- though that may have been more due to Winslow hiding under her once-again-shredded beanie. "Hey Petra, hey Lukas-" she greeted, wincing as she adjusted her tattered headwear, "did you need something?"

"Do you know where there's an inn or a tavern here?"

"I saw some place called 'The Ivory Crow'," Olivia suggested, resting her hand on her hip. "That sounds like a tavern, I guess."

"Alrighty, then, let's go!" and Lukas ran off down one of the streets.

Olivia patiently watched for a moment, Petra looking as though she were about to call out, when the blonde ocelot hybrid came back, his tail curling sheepishly. "Um, where is it?"

* * *

 **A/N: Lukas haha xD**

 **Anyway, so that's what's goin' on so far- now we're gonna delve deeper into the actual finding of the Authors.**

 **I _really_ hope you know who at least one of the Authors is now, because I made it pretty diddly-darn obvious who it was xD I still need... um... two of the Authors to tell me where they wish to be found.**

 **RQTC: Who do you think the remaining Authors are? All four (you already know 2 of them for sure) of them must be correct, and if it's correct I will make you an art on my Deviantart. Orrrr I'll write you a oneshot. Whichever xD**

 **NoItsBecky: I don't know, what do you think? xD**

 **ChoyofBonk: Sans is great with the puns xD better than I am, at least. Nah, just a sarcastic little joke to: A) see if the readers noticed and B) because it's a peaceful little break from Herobrine the white-eyed guy xD And don't worry about Decibels, you can take your time xD**

 **TheRealRedGaming: Sowwy Red xD**

 **S4SH4L4SH4theGaMeR101: Can't make it canon (in the story). Sorry! x3**

 **rebekahtpe: Go read around some other fanfic stories and see if you can come up with a couple more people xD Um, read my response to Choy's comment xD And Everlasting Winter Break; it's too diddly-darn hot in the summer.**

 **RapidSammi: Hehe xD Look at me using the big words xD**

 **Luna96: Was your guess correct? xD**

 **J.M.M.: Ask the question about the fireworks again (or remind me about it), and the review came from someone named 'R. Lutece', but I don't know who they are haha xD**

 **Fireballin17: Here is the next chapter xD**

 **Choco: Sorry friend xD**

 **x.X. A.L. X.x**


	20. Scale

The moment that the tavern door swung open, Lukas ducked. Axel dived to the side, Petra hovered right up out of the way, Olivia bleeped off to one side, and Cassie dove out of the way as several metal tankards and a half-eaten sandwich came flying through the doorway where their heads had been.

"Shhhheeeeesh. Knock our heads off, would you?" Cassie grumbled, readjusting her beanie, underneath which tufts of calico fur poked through. "Do we need to find someone specific?" Having a look around the crowded tavern- and it was _midday_ \- it would take them all day to find someone.

"I don't think so; we just need to ask aro-" Lukas was nearly knocked over by some random guy slinging an arm over his shoulders. He had black hair, wore this tiny little black top-hat, and was wearing a very odd contrast of a yellow and a black suit. He looked a bit like a bee, actually, if Lukas was going to be brutally honest. "Heeeyyyy, buddy pal chum amigo friend buddy pal-"

"Y-you already called me 'pal'," Lukas stuttered out, having tensed up so violently from the sudden 'attack' that he had to shove his now clawed fingertips into his pockets to avoid them being called out.

"Mm, did I?"

Axel coughed awkwardly as the four other teenagers filed into the room and shut the door quietly behind them, watching this guy with his arm around Lukas. "Uh, yeah... you kinda did."

"Oh. Welp! You look like you kinda want to ask a question, isn't that right, mister?" The top-hat-wearing guy grinned at Lukas as if he knew something, which was rather unsettling, but you know what, Lukas did have a question, and he was going to ask it.

"Well, um- yeah, actually, I wanted to ask-"

The black-haired man waggled his finger in front of Lukas, nearly booping the blonde on the nose. "Ah-ah, buddy! You're new to town, aren'tcha? You obviously don't know how stuff works around here. You scratch my back, I scratch yours."

"... come again?" Lukas didn't appear to be the only person who was confused; Olivia was blinking at him and Axel just looked supremely bewildered by everything that was happening.

"He means you help him, he'll help you," Petra picked up helpfully. Lukas had to wonder how she'd understood that before remembering that before she'd been a member of the Hybrid Order, she'd been a trader. And traders probably knew all this lingo.

"Oh."

A cane came flying up and nearly hit Petra in the nose, pausing mere centimeters from her face, making Petra spark violently in shock and make quite a few land on the floor, faint curls of smoke rising from the spots where they'd hit. Axel discreetly stepped on them, trying to put them out before the floor could randomly burst into flames or something. "Ding ding ding!" the top-hat practically _sang_ , "correctamundo! So, if you solve this puzzle for me, I might be able to help you with YOURS. So? How about it?"

"Look, we don't have time for-" Cassie was cut off by Lukas saying, with a slight shrug, "Sure."

He spotted the look on her face and shrugged apologetically. "This'll probably be faster in the long run."

Cassie's lips twisted, and her eyebrows descended over her clear green eyes, but she managed a slow nod.

"Fantastic!" The guy twirled around, nearly catching him in the nose, before slapping his hands down onto the nearest table, making all five teenagers jump a little bit. "One second, please."

Several crashing sounds, a few metal tankards rolling across the floor, and a tiny weight bouncing off of the table and being caught by the top-hat, "and... there we go, all set up."

His hands went to his hips, and he beamed at them. Sitting in front of him was a scale, the kind where you put stuff on one side and that side went down if it was heavier and such. They were currently perfectly balanced, a red button resting on the center of the scales. In front of the scales were eight numbered weights resting in perfect order.

"Here, I have eight small weights that look _exactly_ the same. And yet! One of these weights is just the _tiniest_ bit lighter than the other ones. Using this scale exactly _twice_ , you can discover which weight is the lighter one. So, which one is the light weight?" He crossed his arms and sat back on another table, a funny smile playing on his face.

"..." Cassie stared, before glancing at Lukas. "Do you have any idea how you're supposed to manage this?"

Petra raised her hand a little bit, making all of them look at the Blaze hybrid. "Can I try this?" she asked the top-hat, although she was glancing at Lukas.

The top-hat bobbed his head, beaming. "Sure- the more, the merrier."

Petra stepped forward, glancing at Lukas, the blonde ocelot hybrid shooting her a small grin and stepping out of the way so that she was standing in front of the weights and the scale. (Secretly, he was relieved she was taking charge of the situation; he honestly had no idea what to do.) Taking weights 1, 2, and 3, she set them on one side, before taking weights 4, 5, and 6 and setting them on the other side. The weight didn't change position.

"Oh, to have it weigh the weights," the top-hat added quickly, making the redhead shoot him an irritated look, "you need to hit the red button- right there, kiddo," and he poked a finger at said red button.

Petra poked it herself, and the side which had 1, 2, and 3 wobbled a bit before dipping lower than 4, 5, and 6. Scooping 4, 5, 6, 7, and 8 out of the way, she took 3 off the scale and rested it on the table immediately in front of her before setting two on the other side of 1. She then hit the button a second time. This time the weights wobbled, but didn't dip to either side. Petra immediately picked up 3 and held it up, leveling her gaze right at the top-hat. "This is the lighter one," she said quietly.

The top-hat slowly let a smirk sneak over the corner of his mouth.

"... well. I thought I had _quite_ the puzzle prepared. Looks like you made short work of it. Excellent work, young lady."

* * *

 **A/N: This entire world is literally just an excuse to look at my favorite puzzle game series of all time ever fifty times over xD**

 **RQTC: Does anyone know which this game series is?**

 **Hint 1: There are 6 games in its canonical series, one movie in the canonical series, one spinoff game, and one crossover game with a very law-oriented game.**

 **Hint 2: It was created by Level-5.**

 **Hint 3: There is a new game for this series (not directly for the series games, but a little in the future) coming out in Spring 2017 in Japan, and later this year in English.**

 **Super Hint: They have a hint method like this. They also have Picarats, puzzles (duh), and enough feels to make someone who doesn't generally feel when playing games (like, I hardly ever cry or get super excited) cry. (happy tears)**

 **Now that I think about it, I really want to play the game series over again. Huh.**

 **RapidSammi: Hehehe xD**

 **ChoyofBonk: Well, these kids find it impressive xD And cookies are great xD Also, I totally understand, bro... those chapters are annoying to write.**

 **peienlee: Ahhhhhhh, one off.**

 **x.X. A.L. X.x**


	21. Box

"So, will you tell us what we want to know now, then?" Petra asked, eagerly, nearly slapping her hands down onto the table in her excitement, leaning closer to the smirking top-hat.

The man glanced at Lukas, a smirk coming over his face. "Fire away, young man."

Lukas leaned forward a bit, his eyes narrowing. "Who can recite the first 46 digits of pi here in town?"

The other four teenagers exchanged confused looks, but said nothing. Actually, Axel opened his mouth to ask, but Cassie quickly made him be quiet by stepping on his foot.

The top-hat looked blank for a moment while Axel cursed explosively, before snapping his fingers briskly. "Ahhh... her. I don't know much about the Miss, unfortunately, but I know someone who does." The top-hat jerked his thumb behind him at a woman with her hands neatly clasped in her lap. "She knows more about Ms. BonkChoy than I do. Why don't you try her?"

Lukas glanced up from the top-hat at the woman. Her hair appeared to be purple in the dim lighting, but of course it was rather hard for him to make out in the dim light. looking down at the top-hat, he bowed a bit. "U-um, thanks."

Trotting over to the woman, she didn't even appear to notice until they were practically three inches from her. Then she looked up, deep blue eyes twinkling. "Hmm...? Five newcomers coming to ask me for help... do you need something?"

"Well- um, yes please," Cassie spoke up. "W-we want to know where BonkChoy is? Where the one who can... uh, recite the first 46 digits of pi?" She seemed unsure about this, but upon glancing at Lukas he gave her a confirming nod.

The blue-eyed woman stared at them all for a minute, long enough for the atmosphere to become supremely uncomfortable, before lifting an elaborate wooden box out of her lap and setting it neatly on the table, eyes lifted and fixed upon them. "I've been trying to open this jewelry box for some time now, but it's rather difficult, and the clues to open it are extraordinarily cryptic. Will you all help me?" Her eyes flicked around the group, before inclining her head at Olivia. "You- would you help me, please?"

The Enderman hybrid blinked when she leveled a finger at her. "I- ah, okay." She stepped forward to see the box as the woman turned it around so it was the right side up (on Olivia's side, anywyas), an upside-down boy and a girl facing away from each other on the box with a sun fastened to the bottom of the box.

"So, what are the clues?"

The woman set a sheet of paper on the table silently, her eyes still fixed intently on the group. At this point, it was actually beginning to get a little creepy. Olivia kept her eyes on the woman even though internally all she wanted to do right then was scream and knock something over- she didn't like eye contact very much. When the woman's hand withdrew from the paper, Olivia quickly grabbed it and unfolded it so that she could read the message on it- the clues. Or, well, I suppose I should say clue, singular.

" _The sun rises when you and I meet, and when the wind blows, you will know my heart._ "

Olivia read the single clue on the sheet of paper over until she'd practically memorized it, before setting it down and staring at the box sitting in front of her.

Honestly she had no idea how to go about doing this.

No, it couldn't be that difficult, it was just a puzzle. Stay calm and think carefully. Think out of the box. (Olivia had to smile a bit at the unintentional pun.)

When 'you and I' meet...

That was referring to the boy and the girl facing away from each other, right? So she just had to either get them to meet... She tried sliding them sideways towards each other. No good; it was still stuck. So maybe that wasn't it...

Or, no, maybe, she had to make it so that they were 'meeting' eyes with each other...

Slowly, she began to wiggle the boy figure, until there was a slight clicking sound, and she was able to rotate the boy around so he was facing the upside-down girl, before turning the girl around so she was looking at the boy.

A nearly inaudible clicking sound as another latch disengaged. Olivia gave the box a cursory glance, before experimentally wiggling the lid.

Nope- still locked.

So what had the latch unlocked? What had turning around the boy and the girl done?

 _The sun rises..._

Olivia looked at the sun on the box- it was low down on the box, really resting at the girl and boy's feet, almost.

 _When you and I meet..._

They were meeting now, so...

Olivia took the sun thing and gave it an experimental lift, and sure enough, the sun began to 'rise'. Quickly, she slid the sun all the way up to the top of the box until it wouldn't move anymore, revealing a small hole sitting right there on the thing.

Okay, so... progress! But now she was stuck; was she supposed to do something with the hole?

Oh, right.

 _When the wind blows._

Olivia lifted the box off the table, glancing at the woman for any reaction.

Who was _still_ staring. Seriously, that was getting really creepy.

Lifting the box off the table and up to her mouth, Olivia sucked in a deep breath, before blowing into the hole.

The box suddenly shook, making the sounds of machinery begin to disengage and unwind. Olivia set the box down as fast as she dared and backed away a step as the box kept rattling, a faint music box tune beginning to play, before the lid sprang open rapidly, clacking sharply against the hinges and nearly falling over. "Oh...!" Olivia's dark brown and magenta eye both widened in surprise as the tune grew louder and more lovely than before.

The woman looked at it, before opening one compartment of the box silently, taking out another sheet of paper, and sliding it into Axel's hand- the creeper hybrid looked supremely startled- before turning away again, cupping the box in her hands and no longer staring at them.

All of them crowded around Axel, who slowly opened the paper.

 _Go to the mines for the next clue about the one you are looking for._

* * *

 **A/N: Haha, the adults are just leading these guys around in this giant scavenger hunt, aren't they? xD**

 **So so far, Lukas, Petra, and Olivia have solved a puzzle. Now it's time for Axel to solve one! And then Cassie x3 I love this game too much.**

 **...**

 **actually, I'm in the mood to replay it now, haha xD**

 **RQTC: What's one of your favorite chorus songs?**

 **Mine's Ordeal of Love on Howl's channel. LOOK AT IT IT'S AMAZINGGGG**

 **MissyMattingly: Correct :3**

 **S4SH4L4SH4theGaMeR101: Thanks!**

 **RapidSammi: (determined look) x3**

 **J.M.M.: Oh. No. xD and okay. Also... correct :3**

 **Luna96: (laughs)**

 **RavenBlaze4850: MY FAVORITE GAME SERIES OF ALL TIME. CHECK IT OUTTTTT**

 **Toni42: Heehee x3**

 **x.X. A.L. X.x**


	22. Axel's Puzzle (It Involves Bombs)

"Does anyone else find this annoying? Like at all?" Axel grumbled as they walked towards the gaping mouth of the mines. The path inside was illuminated with torches and tracks that glowed with redstone dust.

"Yeah; but y'know, if we _weren't_ in a world-threatening situation involving Herobrine, I don't think it would bother me all that much," Olivia said, stretching and lacing her fingers together behind her head.

Axel grunted in reply.

Water was dripping off of stalactites (or would that be 'stalagmite'? Now that Axel thought about it, he wasn't sure which one was correct...), making an eerie, echoing sound throughout the caverns. Lukas glanced around, his ears twitching. "Does this cave give anyone else the heebie-jeebies, or is it just me?" he asked finally, as they were approaching a stopped minecart.

"Yeah, it's like one of those abandoned mines in ghost stories," Cassie said, faintly enthusiastically as she looked around the dimly lit cave. "I wonder if the Ivorydennians- or whatever they're all called- have a creepy stories for this place?"

"How's this for an idea- let's not ask," Olivia said tentatively. Axel personally didn't mind scary stories, but at the looks on Olivia and Lukas's faces at the moment, it wasn't a good idea to start talking about them. Petra looked a bit wary, too- not actually _frightened_ , but more alert than anything else.

It also wasn't a good idea because thirty seconds later, a voice rang out in the cavern. "Uh, h-hello? Hello?" The voice sounded a little raspy, as if the person had been shouting for hours or something.

This was enough to make Olivia flinch six feet away and accidentally teleport into a solid wall, Lukas finding himself practically balancing on top of Cassie's shoulders, sharing the space with Winslow, and Petra jump into the air, bang her head on the ceiling of the cave, and flop back onto her back with a pained yelp.

"S-sorry! It's just... uh, I-I could really use your help r-right now..." The male voice rang out through the cavern again.

"I- um, sure," Axel turned around on his heels, around and around, searching for the source of the voice. "Where are you?"

"B-back here..." And the slightest tapping rang out through the cave as Axel kept pivoting, before spotting a blur of motion behind quite a few rocks that were caved into deep, _deep_ crevice that had to be at least 50 feet across and over 50 feet deep, filled with rushing water, the huge rocks practically piled up to the ceiling, with a space barely big enough for even one person to squeeze through.

The creeper hybrid ran over to the pile of rocks, everyone else following more reluctantly. "How the heck did you get back there, dude?"

"S-slight accident with the TNT placed oddly... though that was courtesy of my _numskull_ partner..." There was the sound of someone's hand smacking someone's shoulder, and a soft "Ow!"

A third voice, sounding tired of all this bickering, called out, "Do you think you can try to blast us a relatively flat path out of here? We all aren't totally unharmed from all those rocks."

"Yeah, I'm fairly certain I broke my leg..."

"No one asked you, Jerome."

"There should still be five pieces of TNT over there..." The third voice finished, sounding faintly annoyed by the bickering. "Would you try to bust a flat path out of here so we don't have to try mountain climbing, please?" There was another pause. "It's a type of special 'restrained' TNT, actually, since using normal TNT in the mines is kind of dangerous. It only blasts the thing that it's attached to, and if it's attached to the floor it only destroys everything in a ten-foot radius. It actually took a really long time to try to rig up, now that I think about it. Not to mention-"

Olivia winced. "Well..." Stepping back once, she dropped her voice so that the guy now monologuing about his 'special restrained TNT'. "Couldn't we just teleport in there and teleport them out? Petra can fly over the rocks and get them, and... well... she can get the second one, too..."

Petra shook her head. "That space is way too small; I think _I_ can barely squeeze through that myself, let alone me with some injured guy."

"Can you do three people in a row?" Upon Olivia's shaking head, Axel let out an annoyed sigh and looked around before spotting the TNT. "Well, then, I guess we don't have a choice. Can you get down there so we can put the bombs down and blast a flat path through all this rubble..."

Handing one off to each person, they all started poking through the rocks, huge crevices between the actual rocks allowing them all to slip down and poke through. Axel reached up and touched his chin, eyes narrowing. _Okay, you're the demolition expert... let's see what we can do._

After skating around the crevice the best he could, he found a certain spot where he could look at the narrow cavern at an almost profile view. Looking at the blocks of stone and rubble piled up everywhere, he stared for a full, long three minutes before he smiled a tiny little smile- not really a happy smile, but rather the smile of someone who got it.

"Petra, put that bomb there... and Olivia, that one goes there..." It took a lot of climbing around (and Lukas getting his tail stuck in a crack, and making every person crawling around and Axel and heck, we can probably throw those unfortunate miners listening to all this, too) have a panic attack when Cassie slipped and nearly landed flat on one of the blocks of TNT), but they finally managed to get all the bombs placed in what Axel was _pretty_ sure were the right places.

"Alright, everyone stand back," and Axel couldn't help but stifle a grin when all of his friends backed up so they were against the far wall, before he backed up himself and hit the trigger button.

There was a full five seconds where nothing happened. Axel didn't relax, though- if reading all those comics and watching all those movies when he was little had taught him anything, it was right when the protagonist paused that something happened.

And then there was a flash of white light going off like a flash bomb under the rubble, and with a grinding, thunderous crashing sound that sent dust flying everywhere in a sandstorm, the TNT went off, searing through the rocks as if they were paper.

* * *

 **A/N: One more puzzle, and we don't have to deal with this stuff anymore haha xD I mean, I enjoyed writing it, but... xD Also, Axel's was more of a visual puzzle in the actual game, so I decided to just abbreviate his xD**

 **RQTC: Who do you think the SIX Authors are? (Including Choy and me)**

 **So, I owe you an apology for not updating all weekend. Reasons being, 1) I got sick, so I felt like crap and 2) I wanted to beat the Pokemon League in Pokemon Moon, so I took a quick break of writing. Thanks for being so understanding!**

 **That being said, onto the reviews!**

 **ChoyofBonk: Heehee xD Yes you are. And... yes xD**

 **NoItsBecky: You'll see why it's like that in about 2 or 3 chapters**

 **S4SH4L4SH4theGaMeR101: Oh hey, Petra quote (and only slightly edited, too xD )**

 **rebekahtpe: Haha xD It would. And RQLC: ... yes. Yes, yes, yes, yes, and did I say yes?**

 **RapidSammi: Hehe x3**

 **Emily The Avenger: (laughs) He's done a lot. And... you're missing one.**

 **Toni42: Suffice to say, one that includes explosions xD**

 **Choco: Indeed xD**

 **Red Gaming: Sowwy :(**

 **Luna96: (laughs) Well, glad to see this chappie made you happy!**

 **x.X. A.L. X.x**


	23. A Break So Your Brains Don't Explode

There was a long pause in the air, where only skittering pebbles and the sound of everything settling back down to the earth could be heard. Cassie could barely see anything through the haze of dust that had risen, and wiped a hand across her eyes.

A minute later, she heard Axel's call. "Okay! I think we're cool."

"Are you sure?"

"Well, I mean, what I can see of the rubble is pretty flat now..."

The red-haired girl stood up (and winced in pain as a set of claws scraped at her head in protest) before trotting over in Axel's general direction. It didn't take long to spot the burly male- even through the dust storm, his silhouette was pretty obvious.

She squinted at the dust in the direction Axel was peering, adjusting her glasses three times before finally announcing, "Your eyesight is better than a bat's, I can't see squat."

Axel laughed at that, a boisterous bark that matched his personality perfectly, now that she thought about it. The creeper hybrid crossed his arms. "Well, the dust'll clear up in a minute if no one else comes by."

A minute or two later, the dust finally settled to reveal that Axel was right- the rubble was pretty flat across the huge crevice, three miners crouched and cowering against the back wall- they'd apparently heard Axel's warning about the explosion too.

Axel waved one arm and nearly smacked Cassie in the face by accident. "Hey!" he called, "d'you think you can make it across now?"

One of the miners pushed himself to his feet using only one arm- the other one hung limply at his side- before struggling over to where the rubble was. Poking it with his foot (and confirming that it was solid enough for them to make it across), he glanced up. "I- I think so?" His voice seemed a bit shaky.

"Here, I'll help-" And the miner nearly fell over again at Olivia's voice sounding right in his ear, the Enderman hybrid automatically teleporting over to where he was standing and taking his good arm in an attempt to be helpful.

"I- you- um, okay." The miner gulped a deep breath in, before he nodded, his entire stance becoming a bit more relaxed. "Th-thank you... thank you all..."

"No problem; good thing we had Axel here-" and Petra slapped the big guy on the back, nearly knocking him over (Petra was MUCH stronger than she looked; and she already looked pretty strong)- "he's the expert of blowing things up around here."

Axel blinked at the redhead for a minute, remaining silent during that minute, before finally uttering, "I'm not sure if that was a compliment or not..."

Cassie smirked at that.

Petra looked thoughtful about it for a moment. "... you know, neither do I."

Cassie's smirk grew bigger.

It took a few minutes, but soon all three of the miners were on the right side of the crevice, most of them only having a broken leg or arm, considering they'd been only about twenty feet away from the explosion site. The first and second miner had stopped arguing and were looking more warily at the five teenagers, but the third stepped forward with bright eyes. His face was covered in soot and dust and dirt but Cassie had still never seen someone who looked so relieved to see her. "Thank you for getting us out of there... can we help you with anything? Anything we can do for you?"

"Yeah," and Cassie cut in quickly, "do you know where we can find the person who can recite... I think the first 46 digits of pi?" She glanced back to confirm the nod. Everyone nodded. Okay, so she'd gotten that right. Good.

The miner's face was blank for a moment as he looked at the girl with rose-red hair, before he snapped his fingers lightly (on his good hand, mind you). "Oh, her, yes. Well, actually, you just need to follow," and he pointed with his good arm down the minecart tracks, " _these_ tracks to get to her abode."

Axel blinked. "Her what now?"

"Her house."

"Oh."

The second miner stopped bickering with the first one and glanced up at the third miner. "But, uh, dude, isn't that path blocked by tree roots and vines and stuff?"

"Ahh, I was thinking that was too convenient to be true," Petra finished, snapping her fingers with a faintly frustrated sigh, gold eyes hooding with frustration.

The third miner shrugged. "Cutting the vines should get you guys out of there anyway. Now, if we can...?"

"Oh, okay." And Cassie sidestepped to allow the three battered miners to climb into the minecarts and then speed off back in the direction of the tunnel opening. The redhead put her hands on her hips and looked at the four hybrids standing next to her. "So, let's head for this 'Veggie Girl' now, huh?"

"Um, alright," and the whole group started to move in the opposite direction, following the rails in the opposite direction than the minecart had shot off in. Petra gave a little hop into the air, actually hovering into the air and gliding along with her hands laced behind her head. Olivia was bored now; and since there didn't appear to be anyone in sight, she started teleporting at random intervals down the path. "Ah, that was a lot of tedious brainwork that we all had to do..."

"Oh yeah, how did you solve the riddle with the weights by the way?" Olivia asked, turning to look over at Petra, "You seemed like you knew what you were doing."

Petra shrugged and held out one palm casually. "I used to have this one guy who'd trade with me and he said he'd give me a Nether Star if I could solve that puzzle. It took me a while, but I did manage to solve it-"

"Ohh, so that's how you got a Nether Star..." Lukas interrupted, trailing off thoughtfully. "That actually explains a lot. Like why you said it was 'extremely frustrating, annoying, and tedious'..."

Petra chuckled at that. "Well, it kinda was... 'least it got me used to those sorts of puzzles."

"Cheers to that," Olivia joked with a light laugh.

"Speaking of 'extremely frustrating, annoying, and tedious' things," Cassie spoke up, making them all look at her, "I think we're coming to that part with the vines." And, speak of the devil, they were arriving at this spot where a huge amount of tree roots appeared to be blocking the path, and a wooden sign on the wall next to it.

"'WARNING - these vines/tree roots are what is keeping this tunnel from collapsing in on itself right now. If you are going to come through this way, you need to only cut one spot, or else this entire tunnel will collapse,'" Axel read off the sign.

Lukas let out another sigh; this one sounding much more frustrated. "Yep, that sounds about right."

* * *

 **A/N: Wow, only one more chapter and then I'll get back into my regular updating schedule. Huh.**

 **Also I like how no one got my Bill Cipher reference 3 or 4 chapters ago haha xD**

 **RQTC: Who hates getting sick? (raises hand) I only ask 'cause right now my nose is stuffy...**

 **S4SH4L4SH4theGaMeR101: Good life lesson xD And... maybe? If I have enough patience to get a crap ton of stuff actually ONTO Quotev anytime soon, haha xD**

 **NoItsBecky: (laughs)**

 **ChoyofBonk: Actually, yes xD And awww that sucks :(**

 **TheRealRedGaming: YOU FORGOT A PERSON I ASKED FOR SIX xD Anyways how you doin'?**

 **J.M.M: ...? Sure? And, no, it's just Professor Layton. I asked for the game series.**

 **EmilytheAvenger: (buzzer sound) Incorrect. And... of... what-who now?**

 **RapidSammi: (laughs) Noice.**

 **Toni42: (thumbs up) :3**

 **Luna96: Happy birthday :3**

 **SquiddytheBlaze: Haha xD**

 **x.X. A.L. X.x**


	24. That's Just Vine, Veggie Girl

Cassie let out an irritated sigh and flicked her wrist, a flash of diamond winking at them as the axe handle slapped into her hand, looking up at the wall of vines. "Okay, only cut one vine... so we need to figure out which one vine isn't holding up the tunnel, and which one will open up a big enough hole for us all to get through here."

"And with those two options overlapping, we can hardly just hack and slash our way through to make this quicker," Petra grouched.

"Yeah; otherwise I would've just asked you to burn your way through here," the other redhead mused, squinting at the entangled vines blocking the path. "So, the only places which look they'd be a good spot to cut would be... here, here, here, here," she tapped with the blunt end of the axe at four spots, "and here."

"So... this top left one here doesn't work," Olivia mused, "because it just moves back up and connects to the outside again."

Cassie took a look at that one, before nodding. "Your right; the resulting hole is way too small."

They all regarded the vine wall for a few minutes, mentally tracing the vines with their eyes, before Cassie's eyes lighted on one towards the middle, but still higher up in the right-hand corner. "... I think that might be the one."

"Why that one?" Lukas asked, following her eyes.

"Look- it connects to the ground, and the vine twists around itself and a bunch of these looping vines," Cassie carefully trailed along the vine with her axe, "before..."

"Oh yeah, it connects back to the floor," Petra hummed in agreement, crossing her arms and arching her eyebrow. "Nice eyes."

"Considering I have glasses and usually can't see worth-" Cassie casually used six curses as if saying she was going to go to the supermarket or something, "that is not the most accurate statement."

To Olivia's credit, she didn't look scandalized by the swear or anything- she just laughed. "Well, I guess it's time to see if our guess is going to be right."

"Right, okay," and Cassie hefted the diamond axe, making everyone step back quickly to avoid the winking blade, "everyone get ready to bust out of here if I'm wrong and this tunnel starts coming down on our heads."

With that comforting thought, she drew the axe back and then swung it at the spot in the vines she'd decided to aim at. The axe sliced through the vine with no trouble whatsoever, and Cassie's shoulders immediately went tense as she prepared for the cavern to start shaking and rumbling to signify that they'd something extremely wrong.

Nothing.

Not even the sound of skittering pebbles, not even the sound of the axe hitting the floor.

Cassie slowly lowered the axe, her shoulders relaxing... relaxing... until finally the axehead was resting lightly on the floor. "... wheeeeewwwww!" she sighed suddenly, all of the tension going out of her body as the hybrids relaxed, Olivia's magenta eye ceasing its glowing, Petra's glowing arm and eyes going back to a more normal shade, Lukas's claws resheathing, and Axel's muscles relaxing. "That was so flippin'-" She may actually have been using a stronger term, but their ears may have actually censored it out, "- scary... I thought we were gonna die!"

"Ever the optimist, Cassie," Petra joked, gently clapping her on the back.

Cassie hit the other redhead in the shoulder.

* * *

They had stepped out of the tunnel and started trotting past several trees, before coming to a small wooden house. Well, 'small' being relative- compared to the towering 100-something-foot trees that surrounded the house, it was small, although it was still a rather large house by other standards. (It was nowhere near the size of any of the Order's temples, though, but it was definitely bigger than the treehouse Olivia had used to call home.)

In front of the house there crouched a girl who looked like she could only be a teenager, maybe fifteen, tops. She was looking intently down at her sketchbook (or was it a notebook? They really couldn't tell), doodling away quietly. Her thick, shoulder-length brown hair was almost eclipsing her vision by dangling in her brown almond-shaped eyes. The hair barely brushed against the knitted sweater that was dark green at the shoulders, before fading into a white color by the time it reached her gray sweatpants. A pair of brown leather boots were crossed at the ankle as she swung her interlocked feet lazily. A black, yellow, and pink bracelet was strung around her left wrist, which she occasionally worried when not doodling in the sketchbook.

"U-um, hello?" Lukas called.

The girl's head popped up, her hand straying towards the bow and quiver lying on the steps next to her, alarm flashing in her brown eyes for a moment. There was a moment where all of them wondered if they'd have to fight this girl.

And then she relaxed, a calmer look coming onto her face. "Oh- hi." Pushing herself up to her feet, she bounced on the balls of her feet once, a pleasant smile coming over her face. "Haven't had guests or newcomers in a while- nice to meet ya."

And she extended her hand in a handshake to each of them, giving each of their hands a quick shake before dropping it.

"Hi- are you, um... BonkChoy? Or, uh... 'Veggie Girl'?" Petra got right to the chase, raising her hand a little.

The girl rolled her eyes, the smile dropping slightly as she did so. "Ah, yeah- not exactly my favorite nickname. But yeah." She inclined her head a little bit as she made a faintly sarcastic little bow, her smile growing slightly again as she did so. "My name's Cho Leung, ah, _sort of_ former member of the Authors, and commander of the Senses domain. What can I do ya for?"

* * *

 **A/N: OH FINALLY CHOYOFBONK OFFICIALLY SHOWS UP**

 **So.. yeah. If I hadn't made it abundantly clear by now, the first Author is ChoyofBonk. xD**

 **We're goin' after 'Anton' and 'Rosy Dozy' now xD Then probably Gymmie, and then Becky, but you know, plans might change xD but first we gotta stop by the Builder Games**

 **To the authors in the story, if you haven't already, please let me know where you'd like to be found... so only one person, actually xD**

 **RQTC: Try to guess all six authors. Guess ALL SIX, don't just guess 5. First person to guess all six of them correctly gets a oneshot or a picture on Deviantart, whichever I'm in the mood to make xD**

 **S4SH4L4SH4theGaMeR101: Here you go xD**

 **x.X. A.L. X.x**


	25. Diamblade

**A/N: I lied! We're going after Gymmie next because she and I had this really cool idea for finding her and I want to knock that out of the way. Also, shoutout to EmilyTheAvenger for getting all of the Authors correct. :3**

 **Also realized there was a continuity issue with Cassie and Isa... the team is actually Ivor, Isa, Harper, Ebony, and Nariko- so if you see Cassie in a previous chapter and it's the group with Ivor, just say it's Isa, alrighty? Alrighty. (I'm too lazy to change it xD)**

* * *

"So... this is Diamblade." Everyone was staring at the huge castle and the busy streets surrounding them. People were milling around and chatting in the streets (although most of the talk seemed political; they were talking about things none of them really knew), and most people would act as if the newcomers were normal.

"Actually, Diamblade is a large united kingdom with the smaller kingdoms of Essention City, Coast Eau, Holz Forest, Plano Lands, Caldo Desert, Mountain Cima and North Frio, which is a joined-together region due to them both being in the north of the kingdom. Currently we are in the center, Essention City, which is basically the political capital of Diamblade," PAMA recited rapidly but clearly.

When everyone looked at him, he tapped his head with a little smile. "Mom put that information in to store it- her notes are getting messy."

"So you've been here before, Harper?" Ivor glanced at the dark-skinned woman.

Harper nodded in response. "Yeah, when the other Old Builders and I were putting signs up in the portal network- remember?"

"Ah, yes. So where do you think this 'Gymmie' is?"

Harper's lips twisted together thoughtfully, crossing her arms. "Well... maybe the Founder knows."

"Oh, there's a Founder of this place as well?" Isa sounded faintly surprised, Benedict clucking away contentedly in her arms. "I don't think I spent that much time in here..."

"Yes, didn't you have a cold last time? Technically, now that I think of it, you were either elsewhere doing research in one of the other worlds, or sick... you never actually came to this world..." Harper trailed off. "Never mind. Yes, Diamblade has a Founder. We should probably go and talk to him or something- figure out who this 'Gymmie' person might be..."

"Well, I'm sure if she's an Author, the townspeople have heard of her," Ebony pointed out, making Ivor jump- the black-haired girl had been standing six inches behind him, her tail flicking thoughtfully. Nariko stood next to her, looking up at the much-taller girl with her single functioning indigo eye. "Maybe we could ask around here rather than risk going and dealing directly with the authority?"

"Mmmmnnn. That does sound more appealing... alright, let's split up into groups of three and ask around, then," Harper decided, "Ivor and PAMA will come with me, while Isa, Ebony, and Nariko stick together as well. Is that okay with everyone?"

Isa shrugged, setting Benedict down, the chicken cheerfully fluttering her wings and sending feathers fluttering everywhere. "That sounds alright with me," she responded faintly formally.

Harper waited for everyone to nod affirmatively, before beginning to walk off. "Alright, let's go ask around."

With that, the two groups split up in the huge crowd of people.

* * *

"Did you hear about the game between the Spearheads and the Leaves tonight?" The townsgirl was practically jumping around. "I can't wait to see how Holz Forest does against the Guard!"

"What are you talking about? Spearheads and leaves?"

The girl turned to see a very bemused looking Nariko. "Have you been living under a rock your entire life? The Leaves are the Holz Forest team, and the Spearheads are the Guard's team."

"Team for... what?"

"The soccer game, of course!" The townsgirl explained happily, unaware of the wary look her friend was shooting at her. "Every kingdom'll be there; even the rulers of the various kingdoms. I've heard even Ana and Jack are planning to come, and they don't like leaving the north to come watch the soccer games unless they're REALLY good!"

"There's a soccer game tonight?" This was from Isa, whose eyebrow was raised. Benedict was clucking cheerfully at her feet and running around in little circles.

"Yes! Everyone knows! It's a national thing! It's the national sport of Diamblade! Do you guys not know anything?"

"Soccer is the national sport of Diamblade because of the fact that it stopped the inter-kingdom war. The Holz people were kicking a ball around randomly when some Plano citizens came along. Instead of fighting, they joined in on kicking the ball around, and the game turned into a soccer game. This one soccer game stopped the inter-kingdom war, and then the Founder united the six-or-seven kingdoms to make Diamblade," Ebony rattled off.

Everyone looked at her.

"I read the Atlas earlier when I was bored," Ebony replied as explanation.

A chorus of 'ohhhs' from Isa and Nariko (and even BENEDICT seemed to make this understanding clucking sound) at this explanation.

"When is this game, by the way?" Isa added suddenly, looking back at the townsgirl and her friend. The townsgirl set her finger on her lip. "Ummm, I think it's at 6 or 7."

"It's at 6:30," her friend finally spoke up, having apparently decided that these strangers were harmless, "but people are allowed to start entering the stadium at 6:00. There aren't a few tickets being sold this time around, since it directly involves the Guard. They're only a few iron pieces each, though."

"Where can we buy tickets?" Ebony picked up, glancing at Isa. An understanding look seemed to go between the three girls, and Nariko inclined her head in the smallest nod possible.

The townsgirl pointed down the street. "Down the street, there's a vendor selling tickets- but I'm pretty sure there's only six left, so you might want to hurry."

She'd barely finished when Ebony was bolting down the street, making huge leaping jumps over the crowd using her tail as a booster.

The townsgirl and her friend blinked. "... what?"

Isa rolled her eyes. "I'd better go follow her and get her some iron pieces; I'm not sure she actually has anything. Thank you for the help," she directed this at the townsgirl, before rushing off after Ebony. Nariko scooped up Benedict, bowed rapidly, and then chased after them.

The two townspeople blinked before looking at each other. "... okay?"

* * *

 **A/N: Heehee xD Anton and Rosy-Dosy-Posy (xD) hope you both don't mind me not introducing you next.**

 **RQTC: How many of you procrastinate with homework? (raises hand)**

 **NoItsBecky: Yeah, getting sick is the worst. And thank you! And yep! :3**

 **Toni42: (thumbs up) :3 Glad you like it**

 **Raven: (laughs) Glad to see you noticed it the second time around. I'm glad you liked the chapter!**

 **ChoyofBonk: It would be. And cool! Also, don't worry... not that many people know that nickname, haha xD**

 **RapidSammi: (bounces in circles with you)**

 **Cho: We shall see (wiggles eyebrows) But you know what, when I was reading your review, I actually read it so fast I thought it said 'Cho Chang', like from Harry Potter xD**

 **Guest: Six authors! All five you listed are correct but you must have six!**

 **J.M.M: In general, it's the Professor Layton game series... doesn't matter from what game. Cool. And... okay, that narrows it down to several males that exist on the planet Earth xD**

 **EmilyTheAvenger: Correct.**

 **SquiddytheBlaze: (laughs) Nice job, friend xD**

 **rebekahtpe: (laughs a little bit) Glad you're back.**

 **x.X. A.L. X.x**


	26. Soccer Game

"I can't believe we're watching a soccer game to try to find one of the Authors," Ivor grumbled as they squeezed into the seats.

Harper shrugged. "Well, if we're lucky she decided to come and have a look, and if we're not we'll just have to figure something else out." She looked around the stadium, before rubbing her head. "It's a good thing Ebony heard that hint about the tickets... otherwise we wouldn't have gotten in here.

PAMA was practically standing on his tiptoes, peering around over people's heads. "I've never seen a soccer game before," he said, sounding very interested about this.

Ebony's purple eyes scanned the scene as well, also glowing a little bit with interest. No, really, they were _glowing_ with interest. "Nor have I... it sounds interesting."

"Well, it's _interesting_ ," Isa said reluctantly, lips twisting slightly as she shrugged, "but I don't much like sports."

Benedict let out an agreeing cluck to this.

Nariko happened to be sitting behind someone taller than she was, and she was straining to both see over them and not block everyone behind her. It looked as though she were doing some sort of bizarre dance in her seat. Ivor rolled his eyes a little, although he didn't seem to be able to stop smiling. "It's not that exciting; you don't need to dance in your seat," he told her.

The indigo-eyed Witherstorm hybrid turned to look at him, eyes shining. "But I've never seen a soccer game before," she told him earnestly, her pale, usually sickly appearance practically glowing with excitement.

Honestly, he never would've expected the Witherstorm to take an interest in soccer. Then again, he also never would've expected the Witherstorm to come back as a hybrid in the first place, so...

"Oh! The game is starting!" PAMA exclaimed as he pointed, green hair flopping into his eyes as he bounced up, and everyone immediately turned to watch the field.

One team wearing green jerseys, and the other wearing red, trotted onto the field. Green appeared to be the Leaves, and Red seemed to be the Guard, or the Spearheads. The head of the Red team had her hands on her hips as she surveyed her team.

"Oh? Looks like the head of the Guard is here for the game tonight as well!" the announcer shouted over the cheers of the crowd, Nariko wincing and covering her ears with her hands at the roars of the crowd. "Usually she's busy doing other stuff around Diamblade!"

Harper surveyed the girl, who didn't look any older than a teenager. Her long, dark brown hair with a red streak in it reached down to the middle of her back, matching a pair of dark brown eyes, and her skin looked incredibly tanned. She also looked rather built-looking.

"That's the head of the Guard? ... huh, she doesn't look all that old," Ivor hummed mildly.

Harper would've replied, but then the game started, and they had to take their attention off of the conversation.

The Spearheads and the Leaves actually seemed pretty evenly matched, both teams scoring goals and making the tension in the stadium rise until it was at boiling point. At this point, even the three adults had forgotten how they usually didn't like soccer and were practically sitting on the edge of their seats to see the outcome of the game.

By the time the time was almost out, the game was perfectly tied, and the crowd was practically screaming at the groups for one person to score a goal. The three adults were amused to see PAMA literally jumping up and down in his seat with excitement right then.

The head of the Guard suddenly stole the ball from one of the green players, dribbled it down the field with _amazing_ speed (no, seriously, she was practically blurring down the field), before kicking the ball and launching a beautiful shot right over the goalie's hands into the net, just as the time ran out.

"That's our Gymmie!" the announcer was screaming at the top of his lungs to be heard over the screams of the crowd, and Ivor nearly missed it. Fortunately, he didn't, and his eyes widened as he looked at everyone else significantly.

Isa's head jerked up, and her green eyes widened. "Did he just..."

"Yeah," and PAMA nodded, the little boy also looking shocked. "He did."

"Gymmie, more often known as Samantha Gommadon or 'Gommie', the head of the Guard, has once again won the game for the Spearheads!" the announcer practically roared into the microphone, sounding a little hoarse from screaming his lungs off for the majority of the game.

Gommie, to her credit, wasn't trying to cover her ears like a great majority of her teammates were- she just kind of blinked at the crowd with a big smile before heading off the field, giving the crowd a quick wave.

"Where did Nariko go?" PAMA wondered suddenly.

All three adults' heads snapped to the seat where Nariko had been dancing in place for the past twenty minutes to try to see the soccer game, before spotting the girl weaving through the crowd and making her way over to where Gommie was leaving the stadium, black curly hair bouncing around as she whipped around people precisely.

"She's smart," Ebony sounded impressed by this foresight, before practically catapulting out of her own seat and bolting after Nariko. "Hey! Nariko! Hang on a minute!"

"Don't just run off!" PAMA squirmed out of Harper's grip before bolting down the aisle after them.

The two Old Builders and former Order of the Stone member exchanged a bewildered glance before laughing at this a little bit, and following the three hybrids out of the stadium as the rest of the Guard began to follow the Head out of the stadium as well.

So, they'd just found the Author they were looking for.

Now to see if they could actually get her to help them...

* * *

 **A/N: And the second Author is GirlOfMyOwnWorld, otherwise known as Gommie! (I hope you realized that, I made it super obvious xD)**

 **So I know nothing about soccer, so I bsed my way through this chapter xD I'm sorry to those of you who enjoy or actually play soccer!**

 **Anywho, I hope you liked this chapter despite my complete lack of knowledge of soccer xD and I will see y'all next chapter!**

 **RQTC: Does anyone here play sports?**

 **Not me xD**

 **S4SH4L4SH4theGaMeR101: Honestly my favorite chapter is the next one xD or, wait, maybe it's the one after that...**

 **Emily The Avenger: (thumbs up) :3**

 **NoItsBecky: (laughs) Thanks. I actually had a small idea about it, but you need to let me know if you want me to tell you or if you want me to surprise you, haha xD**

 **LivTheWarrior: I feel ya fam**

 **TheRealRedGaming: I SAID I'm SORRYYYY xD**

 **J.M.M.: Also not helpful... And no spoilers xD**

 **Luna96: Also math. Math is... no.**

 **rebekahtpe: Oh boy xD and no... never watched it xD**

 **x.X. A.L. X.x**


	27. Discipline and Strength

When they finally managed to track down the Author again, she was standing in front of this huge pole. Tilting his head back, PAMA could see this arrow stabbed into the top. Judging from the bow lying on the ground off to the side, Gommie had shot it up there.

"I wonder what this is about," he mused.

Gommie was pacing the ground in front of a bunch of members of the Guard, her expression extremely strict as she surveyed the recruits. "To be a member of the Guard, you need to have both discipline and strength. Which is also what you need," and she jerked her head at the arrow at the top of the pole, "to get that arrow."

She leaned down and pulled a huge weighted medal (at least, that's what it looked like) on a ribbon out of a box. "This one represents discipline," and quickly tossing it so it hung on one shoulder, she pulled the other one out. "And this one represents strength."

"I don't like where this is going..." Ivor mumbled, rubbing his head awkwardly.

Gommie stepped to one of the nearest recruits of the Guard and tied the weights to his wrist, making him nearly do a faceplant in the grass. The red-haired boy glared at her, gray eyes seeming red in the light. "A little warning would've been nice..."

"Too bad..." She checked her clipboard, eyebrows raising. "'Red Gaming'... is that your name?"

"Yeah."

She squinted at him, but decided not to press it. "Whatever. Now, try to reach the arrow," and she jerked her head at the arrow.

Ebony timidly approached the teenaged-appearing girl, the wavy-haired girl with the dark green streak in it (wait... hadn't it been red earlier?) finally noticing them. "Oh, hello. I don't think I've met any of you before..."

Ebony opened her mouth to nod and introduce herself, but then there was a loud thud and everyone turned to see Red on his butt, glaring at the pole as if he'd quite like to swear it out.

Gommie let out a tired sigh and went back over. "Wasn't really expecting it on the first try..."

All of the attempts to get her attention went rather like that- they could manage to get her attention for a couple seconds, but then something else would happen and she'd wander away and have to keep doing stuff for the Guard.

"Okay, we're not getting anywhere with this," Nariko finally stated, eyes narrowing in frustration.

"No duh, Sherlock," Ivor grumbled, rubbing his temples as if he had a headache- which he did, now that he thought about it. He could use a couple aspirin right now. "So what do we do now?"

"Since right now the training exercise seems to be focusing on that pole with the arrow..." Harper spoke up, making Ivor and PAMA immediately look at her. She didn't notice, though, eyes narrowing at the pole. "Maybe if one of us could get to the top of the pole, we could get her attention?" she finally suggested, looking back down at everyone.

Isa looked over to see the recruit members moving off to try a different exercise tiredly, Gommie having left the weights there in sheer exasperation. "Well, if we're going to try, they're all moving off to try something else- so now's our chance, I guess."

Ebony went over, looking at the two weights. She leaned down and wound one around her left wrist, before winding the other one around her right wrist. When she stood up, she staggered sideways a couple steps and very nearly toppled over. "Ah, jeez..."

Looking up the pole, she took a step back, before jumping up as high as she could, her tail and wings giving her a momentary boost and launching the Ender Dragon hybrid higher than she would've managed to get on her own.

With the weights, though, it weighed her down significantly, making her only reach about one third of the way off the ground before she seized the pole in a bear hug. She managed to inch up the pole another couple of inches before losing her grip and toppling backwards, landing on her butt much like 'Red Gaming' had a minute earlier.

"... ouch," she grumbled.

* * *

Nariko was extremely strong.

This had been proven several times by accident in the portal network (including at one point her punching PAMA on the shoulder and knocking him through a portal by accident), but even with all of her strength the two medals made her extremely unsteady on the pole.

She did make it about the same spot where Ebony had reached, though, before finally sliding back down.

Upon reaching the ground in a slightly more gentle fashion (although she still staggered unsteadily upon landing on the ground), she wrenched the medals off her wrists and rubbed them. "These things are _heavy_ ," she grunted in complaint.

Ivor had been watching the two girls with a deadpan face, before turning to Harper. "I bet six iron that we're not even going to make it three feet up this pole, let alone the height those two reached," he said finally.

"I'm not taking that bet."

* * *

Isa landed flat on her back. Thankfully Benedict had seen her owner falling and had dashed out of the way before the Founder could squash the Eversource flat by accident.

" _Ow_ ," she growled, unwinding the medals from where they'd been wrapped tightly around her wrist. "Why are discipline and strength so damn _heavy_ ," she grunted darkly.

Harper raised her eyebrow at the younger Old Builder. "That marks the first time I've ever heard you _curse_ , let alone in front of children."

"Well, one child," Isa responded, struggling to her feet in a wobbly fashion, wincing a bit as she rubbed her lower back. "Do you have an extra healing potion?" she asked Ivor.

He just pulled out six bottles of the stuff and held one out to her.

* * *

Ivor was not a sporty person, but he surprised everyone by making it to about 12 feet up the pole, before finally losing his grip and landing on the ground.

Harper ran over and knelt next to him, fumbling through his potion bag (which he'd given to her to hold while he attempted to climb this thing). "Are you alright?" she asked briskly, gray eyes narrowed in worry.

"I'm sore, my wrists are chafed, and I think I've got a splinter. I'm doing great," Ivor responded, giving her a faint smile to show he meant no harm.

She returned it before handing him a healing potion. Ivor looked at it before clenching the neck of the bottle between his teeth and jerking off the medals first, rubbing his wrists before taking the potion out of his mouth and draining the whole thing.

"Oh, isn't it your turn next?" he added suddenly, looking up at Harper.

She groaned and covered her eyes. "Ohh, don't remind me..."

* * *

Harper didn't even make it six feet before dropping back to the ground, her arms shaking. "I wasn't trained for this," she grumbled.

"Yeah, you were trained to make redstone machines," Isa grinned lopsidedly at Harper. "Kinda like how Ivor was trained to make potions and how I was trained as a martial artist."

The white-haired woman let out a brief laugh as she unwound the ribbons from around her wrists, before glancing at PAMA. "PAMA, you don't have to try if you don't want to-"

"I wanna try!" Before Harper could even finish the statement, she had the medals snatched from her hands as the little kid darted over to the pole. She blinked and rubbed her head with a sheepish little smile.

"He's enthusiastic."

Harper laughed at Ivor's comment, leaning into the slightly taller potionologist, oblivious to the blush that was beginning to spread over his cheeks. "You have no idea."

PAMA squinted at the pole, before throwing his arms around the pole and letting the medals sling around each other, locking together so that there was a loop around the pole.

Ivor slapped his hand to his forehead, making Harper laugh a bit.

Slowly, he began to climb up the pole, having to toss the medals a little higher each time he ascended.

He reached the halfway point before slipping a little. At this point, a lot of the recruits were trickling back over to point out the little kid making it that far up the pole. Harper held her breath as PAMA dangled in place for a couple seconds before regaining a foothold and straining to heave himself to a higher point.

By the time he'd reached the top of the pole, even some of the senior members of the Guard and _Gommie_ had come back over.

PAMA trembled in place for a second, before unwinding one medal and hastily hauling himself to the top of the pole before he could slip and fall, his shoulders shaking with the effort it had taken before pulling out the arrow and tossing it down. Gommie opened her palm and caught the arrow by the shaft, raising her eyebrow a little at the kid as all of the recruits cheered.

"Smart kid," Isa said, smiling at Harper.

"Thank heavens for that."

PAMA panted there for a moment, his face red with exertion and his fluffy green hair even messier than before. He looked down for a moment, before looking back up again. "Can someone get me down from here?" he called down in exhaustion.

* * *

 **A/N: (laughs quietly)**

 **Good thing PAMA's smart, huh? I think he took 'discipline and strength together' and figured it out, but that's just me xD I loved this scene from Mulan, haha xD**

 **Oh finally we got Gom's attention like gosh xD**

 **S4SH4L4SH4theGaMeR101: x3**

 **RapidSammi: I don't have the potion with me, sorry Sammi-kun xD**

 **rebekahtpe: Blanket... I don't play the piano xD and I'm glad you liked the chapter!**

 **Emily The Avenger: (grins a bit) Hehehe**

 **J.M.M.: That doesn't narrow it down at all... xD**

 **TheRealRedGaming: Nice :3**

 **ChoyofBonk: Nope xD**

 **Luna96: DS, because that's what I personally have and play games on xD**

 **SquiddyTheBlaze: NOPE. I'm good. I don't want to rule over the world... that would be pretty much a nightmare.**

 **Toni42: Somehow you managed to comment seven times on the same chapter and it's the same comment xD It was actually on her form, hehe xD**

 **x.X. A.L. X.x**


	28. Notice

"Uh... hey, everyone." Aiden adjusted the mike, nearly popping it out and dropping it smack on his foot. "Well, I'm Aiden, from Minecraft: Story Mode. I... hope you all know that."

Several audience members laughed.

"Well, anyway, Ariza Luca wanted to leave a message for every reader of Recode Reality out there, but she's... uh... currently running on Minecraft Story Mode and music, so she just wrote it down for us to present it." He glanced down at the paper, before giving the audience a nervous grin and dragging Mevia onto the stage, the pale-blue-haired woman stumbling a bit as he towed her to the mike and put the paper in her hands. "Annnnd now Mevia will deliver the message!"

And he hightailed it back offstage.

Mevia blinked several times, before she cleared her throat and flicked some hair back, in a way that said " _I really don't want to be up here right now."_ "So, uh, I'll be reading the note that Ariza left for you all now."

" _Hey guys! Long time no update on this story, haha. Uh, sorry that this isn't an actual_ update _for the story, but this is regarding Minecraft: Story Mode's Season 2, which comes out in 10 days! So excited for it :3_

" _Well, but that changes plans for Recode Reality. BECAUSE there's a Season 2 for MCSM now, I've had a change of ideas, and I'm thinking I ought to change the idea again to fit the Season 2, although a FEW elements from RR will make its way into Composite- which is the sequel for Hybrid! (Yes, I know I said it was Miscegenation before, but the definition of that is..._ "

Mevia trailed off, blinking at the paper, a pale blush making its way over her face, before she took it and walked offstage again, shoving the paper into Isa's hands. "I am not reading that."

Isa looked down at the paper, her own face getting a bit pink as she read over the definition. "... ah." Clearing her throat, she walked onto stage and picked up smoothly, skipping over the definition. " _So I changed it. So, unfortunately, that means Recode Reality will be discontinued._ "

A loud series of groans and a few boos.

Isa scowled at them a bit, crossing her arms. "Don't shoot the messenger; you're going to have to take this up with Ariza." She then resumed reading.

" _However, I WILL share the possible first chapter for Composite that I am... literally making up right now on the spot._ "

The audience literally _exploded_ into cheers, making the Founder of Sky City wince and step back a bit as everyone cheered.

Isa paused, waiting for it to calm down, before clearing her throat again and beginning to read.

* * *

 ** _LOG 1-175_**

* * *

 _Nothing built can last forever. Every legend, no matter how great, fades with time. Each year, more and more details are lost to time and age, until all that remains are myths- half truths._

 _To put it simply, lies._

 _And yet, in all the known universe, from a small town that was devoured by a living storm to a dimension that not even the Old Builders could ever access, the legend of the New- or HYBRID - Order of the Stone endures, unabridged, as self-evident fact._

 _Indeed, it is only troubled lands that are in need of heroes, and we are so fortunate to have had, not so very long ago, FIVE heroes such as these._

 _PETRA the Blaze hybrid, whose hot temper, glowing blade, and deadly flames was often the fiery end to many a battle, even if said hot temper was the very thing that caused said battles._

 _OLIVIA the Enderman hybrid, an amazing redstone engineer and a creature of the elusive End, where the monstrous Ender Dragon used to dwell, since before the Hybrid Order existed._

 _AXEL the Creeper hybrid, whose explosive nature and destructive creativity caused damage greater than even the King of Boom Town could've imagined, and repaired damage that could've been far worse._

 _LUKAS the Ocelot hybrid, whose sharp claws and mind carried his team even when their situation was dire, and whose loyalty never wavered, even before he could remember the others he'd called his friends._

 _And JESSE, the Spider hybrid, who was always willing to lend her six hands to anyone in need, an amazing multitasker and friend, the first hybrid that the Old Builders ever created, and leader of the Hybrid Order of the Stone._

 _The road that these FIVE heroes, FIVE friends have followed was paved by those who came before them. The Old Builders, the Old Order of the Stone, the Bureau of Amalgamology. They've discovered so many things that may not have been possible had they not been what they were. New friends, new enemies, new allies, old friends, deaths and rebirths, memories that have been lost, then found, then fit back into place like a puzzle._

 _Their greatest quests have been recorded and stored, in a book that remains in the Order of the Stone's treasure room, a file on a computer in the Bureau of Amalgamology, a distant file on a former scientist's computer, in one of who is known as the 'Author's' computers, and their story will be passed down and retold and passed down again through generations, and generations, and more generations. So many enemies have been defeated, and so many more have been made a friend._

 _These FIVE friends have given so much to be remembered as FIVE heroes, and have definitely proved that what Gabriel the Warrior once said, not so long ago, is true._

 _Anyone can be a hero._

 _Even a hybrid._

 _This has been completed. The book has been closed._

 _Their story has ended._

* * *

 _ **LOG 2-1**_

* * *

 _Once a story has been completed, it can never be reopened._

 _It's over. No matter how hard you try, even the most powerful Author can do no more but add to it, write more. They can never go back and change the story, for better or worse. No matter how many times you try, how hard you attempt, how desperately you desire it to change, the story can never be reopened. You would have to break the laws of reality itself in order to change it._

 _Theoretically, if a story was reopened, we would have to continue it until there came a time when we could close it once again._

 _But you would be unable to do so._

 _Once a story is reopened, there is almost no way to close it again. A reopened story is trapped in a vicious loop, of closing, reopening, closing again, and reopening again- over and over. The story would go on forever, and ever, and ever, and because every story has an ending- how else would new stories be made?-With no new stories, the natural order would be corrupted, and eventually the story would wipe out the universe itself._

 _That is why stories cannot be reopened, and that is why you would have to change reality itself in order to reopen a story._

But that is only for most situations.

 _Jesse and her friends have been living happily for the past 7 years, I'm happy to say. Jesse is now the mayor of Beacon Town- her hometown- that has slowly grown and evolved as years as ticked on by._

 _But in these past 7 years, things have become more complicated. The Hybrid Order of the Stone's bond of friendship has begun to fade. With little time for adventures, more responsibilities, and less time for simple interactions, old friendships have begun to fade, rivalries have begun to emerge, and people are beginning to have higher and higher expectations for the spider hybrid- expectations that even the leader of the Hybrid Order may not be able to fulfill._

 _Well, at least until Jesse somehow manages to get her hand stuck in a creepy, cursed prismarine gauntlet... and finds a mysterious phone that is intent on helping Jesse repair the 'damage' done to Jesse's world._

 _We discover the downside of fame that comes with being a hero, too. For example, having a dark and ancient power know your name, an Author who needs the world's greatest hero to 'close a story', hybrids of beings that were never_ _meant to be hybrids, and_ _the omniscient presence that permeated her life throughout her adventures since the Witherstorm's creation becoming a much more tangible force._

 _A new adventure beckons, sending the spider hybrid on a journey that'll take her to the darkest depths of the world, and farther. With old friends and new allies alike, fortune hunters, frenemies, old friends, family members, an Author or two, or three, or ten, and a rather disobedient llama, Jesse will embark on this journey of tough choices, peril, mystery, and the responsibility to help an Author close a story that was never meant to be reopened._

 _My friends, if we are going to have any hope of closing a reopened story, if we're to have any hope in breaking this vicious loop, we are going to have to fight a myth with another myth. A story with a story._

 _Even more potently, the story's creator._

 _As this story unfolds, we're going to find out exactly how a story that was never meant to be reopened-_ should never _have been reopened, did exactly did._

 _And we're going to find out exactly why this story has become a **COMPOSITE**_.

* * *

Isa finished reading and folded up the paper. "That's, uh... that's about it, folks!"

"Folks? Really?" Milo asked, raising his eyebrow at the Founder.

"... be quiet."


End file.
